BJP bigwigs face ‘drought’ on tour

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The tour of drought-hit areas in Mysore by two BJP bigwigs—former CM D.V. Sadananda Gowda and deputy chief minister K.S. Eshwarappa—proved to be a damp squib with the response from the people very poor. People suspect that the tour is a preparatory programme ahead of the next assembly polls with the leaders holding a taluk-level party workers’ meeting in Bilikere.

The tour was confined to only 4 villages in Mysore and Hunsur taluks with the two leaders hardly spending 30 minutes speaking to the aggrieved farmers. Travelling in a contingent of over 30 cars, they made quick stops at Handanahalli and Doddabeechanahalli villages and zoomed through two other villages before concluding the exercise with a meeting attended by officers at the deputy commissioner’s office.

The tour was wasteful exercise, remarked Mahadev, a farmer at Doddabeechanahalli. “How will anyone understand our woes in just 10 minutes? If they are really concerned, they should spend more time speaking to people and getting to know their problems”, he said. Mr Eshwarappa and Mr Gowda however contended that their tour was an attempt to understand the ground reality. “There are no political motives. Mr B.S. Yeddyurappa and Bengaluru South MP Ananth Kumar are on parallel tours in their designated districts to get information about people’s woes”, they said. They however had no answer when asked why BSY had deviated from his tour plan and was now planning to visit the southern districts.

Mr Eshwarappa tried to shift the blame to the central government saying the state had not been compensated for the cross loss suffered by Karnataka, which is estimated at Rs 11,600 crore. Despite central drought assessment teams emphasizing on the severity of the drought in Karnataka in their reports, the Union government has chosen not to help the state, he lamented.