Former Union minister claims it was an ‘unauthorised’ tweet, but BJP pounces on this calling it a message from Moily’s ‘conscience’, attacks Siddaramaiah govt.
Bengaluru: A post from senior Congress leader and former Union minister M. Veerappa Moily’s Twitter handle has left him and the party red-faced.
The tweet that Moily claims was an “unauthorised” one accuses Karnataka PWD minister H.C. Mahadevappa of using money power and his nexus with corrupt contractors in selecting candidates for the upcoming assembly elections, due in May.
“INC needs to solve money in politics. We can’t afford to have road contractors and their nexus with the state PWD minister determine how candidates are selected for the upcoming assembly elections,” says the tweet posted around 10 pm Thursday. Incidentally, the same tweet also appeared on the Twitter handle of his son Harsha.
The opposition reacted to this within hours with BJP chief ministerial candidate and the party’s state president B.S. Yeddyurappa calling it a message from Moily’s “conscience”, which validates the BJP’s stand that the corruption levels were so high in the government that Siddaramaiah has been termed the “10 per cent CM”.
Union minister Sadanand Gowda took to social media calling Mahadevappa the ‘poster boy’ of the Karnataka CM and questioned him; “ Where will you hide now Mr H C Mahadevappa, PWD minister of Karnataka. Poster boy of #10 percent Cm@siddaramaiah government. May he need to collect bk money spent on CM &Save for his existence in Karnataka for retirement life post Karnataka election defeat” he tweeted.
Moily, however, denied making such statements.
“I will never use a social media platform to criticise the party. I will delete it. It was an unauthorised tweet and I will have to find out who did it,” Moily told ThePrint.
Moily’s son, Harsha is yet to clarify his position.
The fact that the tweet had not been deleted despite Moily’s statement has led some leaders to question if this was a ploy to set the cat among the pigeons and later deny that by saying his account was hacked.
This is not the first time a senior Congress leader in Karnataka has raised the issue of corruption and money power being used for selection of candidates by the party. In 2008, Margaret Alva had alleged that election tickets were for up for sale when her son Nivedith and another senior leader Jaffer Sharief’s son were denied tickets. She had questioned if there were different rules for different people? “Are they terrorists or smugglers,” Alva had asked at that time.
Mahadevappa, a close confidante of chief minister Siddaramaiah, had faced corruption allegations earlier as well. His name allegedly figured in the infamous diary I-T officials recovered from the residence of an MLC, Govindraju, last year which lead to protests seeking his resignation.
He could not be reached for a comment.