Karnataka IT/BT Minister Priyank Kharge on Monday sought an investigation into an allegation by Anwar Manippady, the former chairman of the Karnataka State Minorities Commission, that BJP state president and MLA B Y Vijayendra had offered him Rs 150 crore to hush up his report on Waqf encroachments.
Addressing a news conference along the sidelines of the Legislature’s Winter Session, Kharge showed videos of Manippady making allegations against Vijayendra in the past. This came after the BJP state president objected to the charges levelled against him during a discussion on Waqf properties held on Friday.
Kharge said he would petition the home minister to investigate the matter where Vijayendra had allegedly met Manippady to hush up his report on Waqf property encroachments by influential politicians to the tune of Rs 2.3 lakh crore. “Let there be an investigation over the issue… The Congress did not level the allegations, but a BJP spokesperson who was appointed the head of the minority commission.”
Playing a video of Manippady shot a few years ago, where he had lashed out at Vijayendra for asking him to “quote an amount”, Kharge said BJP parliamentary board member and former chief minister B S Yediyurappa and Vijayendra were accused by their own partymen of conniving to cover up the report.
On demands by Vijayendra earlier in the day for a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the issue, the minister asked why the top BJP and RSS leadership had not probed the encroachments even after Manippady wrote to them about widespread irregularities.
Vijayendra, speaking at the Assembly during Monday’s first half of the session, dismissed the allegations against him. “I challenge Chief Minister Siddaramaiah to institute a CBI probe into allegations that I offered Rs 150 crore (to Manippady). Along with it, let there be a CBI probe into the Manippady report and the Mysuru Urban Development Authority (MUDA) scam where CM is an accused,” he said. He also demanded Congress legislators to apologise for levelling baseless allegations against him.
The Manippady report was ordered in 2012-13, during the tenure of Jagadish Shettar as the chief minister of Karnataka. Though it was submitted to the state government in March 2016, it was rejected by the then Congress government after it was placed before the Cabinet.
Earlier in the day, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah defended his Cabinet colleague Kharge regarding the allegations against Vijayendra. On the former minority commission chairman denying the allegations made by him after his remarks rocked the Assembly Friday, the CM said, “Manippady had made those statements in the past… If he now denies it, what can be done?”
Home Minister G Parameshwara told reporters that Manippady was threatened to retract his statements about the BJP president offering him bribes. “We will discuss the future course of action and take a call,” he said.
Though the BJP was hoping to corner the ruling Congress over Waqf notices, the treasury benches had succeeded in taking the wind out of the Opposition sails after Kharge released footage of Manippady levelling charges against Yediyurappa and Vijayendra during a discussion on Friday. Soon after, Siddaramaiah sought a CBI probe against Vijayendra, even as the BJP state president maintained that the charges were baseless.
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