K’taka CM questions motive of BJP’s march against Ballari violence

CHief government minister Siddaramaiah on sun fleecy apart the Bharatiya Janata company’s plan to take out a march condemning recent violence in Ballari, saying the opposition was free to protest but questioned its political motives.Responding to a query about the BJP’s proposed padayatra, Siddaramaiah said, “Let them do what they said they should not.”The chief minister attributed the clashes in Ballari to the removal of banners put up for the unveiling of a statue of Maharshi Valmiki, calling the action an unnecessary provocation. “Removing the banner instigated the incident,” he said, asking why the banners needed to be taken down in the first place. He accused former ministers G Janardhana Reddy and B Sriramulu of acting out of political jealousy, saying they were no longer in positions of power in the region.Violence broke out in Ballari city on January 1 between supporters of BJP MLA G Janardhana Reddy and those aligned with Congress MLA Nara Bharath Reddy after a dispute over the installation of a political banner near Janardhana Reddy’s residence escalated into stone-pelting and firing. Police said 26 people had been arrested in connection with multiple incidents linked to the banner dispute. “Based on evidence collected during the investigation, including witness statements and video footage, police traced and arrested 26 accused and produced them in court,” the police said in a statement.Earlier, home minister G Parameshwara said the government was considering handing over the case to the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), a day after police detained Baljit Singh and Gurucharan Singh, identified by officers as a private gunman whose revolver was allegedly used in the firing.Siddaramaiah questioned the BJP’s decision to organise a padayatra from Ballari to Bengaluru on January 17, and recalled the Congress’s own protest march more than a decade ago. He said the party had undertaken a 320-kilometre padayatra from Bengaluru to Ballari in August 2010 to highlight illegal mining and corruption under the then BJP government. At the time, he said, a Lokayukta report by justice Santosh Hegde had described Ballari as having been turned into a “Republic of Ballari,” with illegal mining rampant.“When I raised it in the Assembly, the Reddy brothers and Yediyurappa objected, so I led a padayatre to Ballari,” he said, adding that the Congress had launched the march under the banner “Ballari Chalo” after accepting a challenge thrown by Janardhana Reddy, Karunakara Reddy and their associate R Sriramulu.The BJP, however, has accused the Congress government of failing to maintain law and order. In Mysuru, R Ashoka, the Leader of the Opposition in the Legislative Assembly, announced that the party would hold a “massive protest rally” in Ballari on January 17 to condemn the violence. “The unrest in Ballari is a systematic conspiracy carried out against MLA Janardhana Reddy, who could not tolerate his return to the BJP,” Ashoka said at a press conference.He said the BJP would organise similar programmes in other parts of the state, including a conference in Mysuru on January 31 to protest what he described as the government’s failure to control the drug network, and another in Hubballi targeting alleged irregularities in the Grihalakshmi scheme.