New Delhi: Congress members walked into the Karnataka Assembly’s Budget session Friday with flowers tucked behind their ears.
Opposition leader Siddaramaiah sat wearing an orange flower behind his right earlobe, as did other party lawmakers.
The act points to a Kannada slang – “keevi mele hoovu” – which literally means “flower on the ear” but symbolically tells off someone who is trying to take you for a ride or cheat you.
This was the message that Congress leaders sent across to Karnataka’s BJP Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai, who presented the state’s last budget Friday before the imminent elections.
The Congress told him, ironically with flowers, that the BJP government had not fulfilled its promises in the previous year’s budget as well as its 2018 pre-poll manifesto.
In response to this taunt, Bommai retorted, “Opposition leaders had placed flowers on the ears of the people so far. This year, we will watch citizens place flowers on the ears of Congress MLAs.”
This led to a minor verbal duel between the BJP and Congress members, after which the chief minister presented the budget.
Bommai on Friday promised a gigantic Ram Mandir in the Ramanagara district of Karnataka and said that Rs 1,000 crore had been allocated for mutts and temples.
The chief minister claimed this budget would help the state for another 25 years.
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