How did you treat BSY? Shivakumar asks Modi

NT Correspondent

Bengaluru / Shivamogga: Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president DK Shivakumar shot back against Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s jibe of “betrayal of Karnataka’s leaders” by questioning him about BJP’s treatment of former chief minister BS Yediyurappa.

Modi during his visit to Shivamogga had said: “It is the Congress party’s tradition to disrespect Karnataka’s political leaders, even those of its own party. History is proof of how leaders like S Nijalingappa and Veerendra Patil ji were insulted in front of the Congress family. Kharge ji is the Congress President, but the entire world knows who holds the remote control by the way he is treated.”

The PM was seen as offering a fig leaf to Lingayats by sharing the stage with Yediyurappa and publicly sympathizing with Lingayat leaders who had a falling out with Congress in the past. Shivakumar retorted by telling mediapersons that unlike Modi, he knew what had happened with Veerendra Patil and instead chose to question the PM over Yediyurappa’s removal as chief minister.

“Where was the deference that Prime Minister Narendra Modi showed former chief minister BS Yediyurappa at the Shivamogga airport inauguration all this time? Let the prime minister clarify why he (Yediyurappa) was removed from power, which had caused him to cry,” Shivakumar said. The Karnataka Congress president on Tuesday toured JD(S) stronghold Hassan district as part of the party's Praja Dhwani Yatra