Karnataka polls: PM Modi calls JD(S) ‘Congress’ ‘B’ team’ at HDK’s home turf Channapatna

CHANNAPATNA,APR 30: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday seems to have explored all possibilities to criticise the regional JD(S) as “a party that has been reduced to a family” and as “a B team of the Congress party” in the run-up to the May 10 assembly polls.

Modi who campaigned for BJP candidate and MLC CP Yogishwara apparently targeted JD(S) and indirectly the former chief minister H D Kumaraswamy as a stiff fight is on between the duo. Addressing a huge crowd that was irresistible in hooting ‘Modi Modi…” slogans, the prime minister made the most of it to criticise Congress and JD(S).

It was during the 2018 assembly polls Congress leader Rahul Gandhi had called JD(S) as BJP’s ‘B team” and this time none other than PM Modi picked it up as the BJP planned to win more seats in the old Mysuru region where the JD(S) is a strong force to be reckoned.

“For Congress and JD(S) Karnataka is an ATM but for BJP it is the growth engine of the country’s development. The JD(S) openly declared that it can become a kingmaker by winning 15-20 seats. But all for a single family’s selfishness at the cost of the interest of people. Every vote to JD(S) will straight away go to Congress. Karnataka has seen the drama of unstable governments for a long time wherein the fight will be only for looting “, he alleged.

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He also slammed the Congress’s guarantee schemes as a bundle of lies as none of the promises made in other states during the polls were implemented including in Himachal Pradesh despite them coming to power.

“The women folk there are still waiting to get the Rs 2,500 per month and this is the true color of that party”, he pointed out.

“Every guarantee is a bundle of lies as the Congress party’s warranty has gone. But the true guarantees are PM Kissan Nidhi, Ayushaman Baharat health scheme as they helped the beneficiaries”, he remarked.

Modi also spoke on specific issues of the land of silk Ramanagara and the ‘land of toys’ Channapatna including the Rs 10,000 financial assistance for sericulture farmers and reducing the import of silk and export of the toys. “Congress had destroyed the Channapatna toys by allowing imports but now their exports have increased by 70 per cent and import of toys from abroad reduced”, he pointed out.

Taking opposition leaders’ criticism in the right spirit, Modi claimed that he was able to make a century in his ‘man ki baath’ series of speeches but the opposition tried to make a century by scolding him with nicknames. ” I am called a snake, but I am a snake that garlands the neck of lord Shiva. For me here the people are my lord shiva”, he said.

He was responding to AICC president Mallikarjuna Kharge calling him a ‘venomous snake’ at a public rally held at Naregal in Gadag district recently.

-PTI