By V.S. Karnic, IANS,
Bangalore : From being a well-governed state, proud of its capital Bangalore hailed world over as an IT powerhouse, Karnataka is now being tagged as the “most corrupt” state in the country.
As if this was not enough, the state is also becoming a butt of ridicule because the Bharatiya Janata Party’s first chief minister in southern India, B.S. Yeddyurappa, wants gods to decide whether his predecessor H.D. Kumaraswamy of the Janata Dal-Secular speaks the truth or not.
Irony is that Karnataka is in the news, but for all the wrong reasons, while US President Barack Obama frequently mentions Bangalore to prod American youth to excel in science and maths to beat competition from India.
A curious fact is that Karnataka’s problems caused by man and nature became frequent national news as Bangalore’s reputation as a tech hub grew worldwide from 1999 onwards.
S.M. Krishna, the present foreign minister of India, is credited with turning Bangalore into a software giant during his chief ministership in 1999-2004. The five years of his rule saw, among other problems, frequent drought, resulting in water row with neighbouring Tamil Nadu, and kidnap of a popular Kannada film star by forest brigand Veerappan and riots over it.
These problems defeated the Congress in the 2004 assembly elections and heralded political instability. The state saw two coalition governments in four years – Congress-JD(S) in 2004-06 and JD(S)-BJP in 2006-07.
With the JD(S)-BJP coalition corruption became talk of the town, ironically thanks to the Reddy brothers, the iron ore mining barons, and BJP law makers, two of whom are ministers in the Yeddyurappa cabinet.
G. Janardhana Reddy, the most vocal of the three brothers and now tourism minister, started it off in late 2006 alleging that Kumaraswamy, who was then chief minister of the JD(S)-BJP coalition government, had taken Rs.150 crore bribe from mine owners.
The case went up to the Supreme Court where Reddy withdrew it.
However, the repercussions of what he set off are being felt even today with Yeddyurappa being accused of being the country’s most corrupt chief minister and making Karnataka the most corrupt state.
The latest to express dismay over corruption in the state is Karnataka Chief Justice J. S. Khehar who is reported to have said “now we can say Karnataka is the most corrupt state”.
His comments came June 22 during the hearing of a petition on withdrawal of licence for granite quarrying.
Justice Khehar reportedly said that “Corruption is increasing. I have been reading in the magazines that Karnataka is the most corrupt state. But we can say here now that Karnataka is No. 1 corrupt state in India.”
Justice Khehar’s comments did not create the ripples that such strong observation from the judiciary generally does as the attention was on Yeddyurappa falling back on gods to prove he is innocent of charges against him by Kumaraswamy.
The chief minister was widely ridiculed and lambasted for challenging Kumaraswamy to repeat on oath at Manujnatha Swamy temple in Dharmasthala his claim that Yeddyurappa had “offered money if I agree not to release any more documents on graft involving the chief minister and his family.”
The swearing in the name of god at Dharmasthala, about 300 km from here, on June 27 is now off after BJP president Nitin Gadkari told Yeddyurappa to desist from dragging religious places to settle political tussles.
However, Yeddyurappa and company will have to do more than taking god’s name to prevent the state from going down as the most corrupt in the country and ending up a joker in the pack.
(V.S. Karnic can be contacted at [email protected])