Bengaluru, Oct 24 A day after Yathindra Siddaramaiah alleged a Congress-led sting operation targeting his father, former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, senior BJP leader R Ashoka on Saturday accused the ruling party of dirty tricks and took a swipe at Rahul Gandhi’s “Mohabbat ki Dukaan” slogan.
The Leader of Opposition in the Karnataka Assembly said the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) was no longer a political party but a “shameless mafia syndicate thriving on dirty tricks”.
Yathindra alleged on Friday that members of his own party, the Congress, were behind a purported sting operation aimed at tarnishing his father’s image.
He said a video related to the alleged operation appeared to show the involvement of a Congress woman seeking a party ticket from Puttur and the head of a media organisation.
“Mr Rahul Gandhi, is this your ‘Mohabbat ki Dukaan’ or a wholesale ‘Sting Operation ki Dukaan’? Karnataka politics has hit the ultimate moral gutter, and the architects of this filthy backstabbing are none other than the ruling Congress leaders themselves,” Ashoka said in a post on X.
Alleging that governance had been paralysed, Ashoka accused Karnataka Congress ministers of using secret sting operations, running extortion rackets and blackmailing party members to secure tickets and settle personal scores.
“Mr Rahul Gandhi, is this your hollow ‘Guarantee Model’? Is recording covert sting videos, extortion and stabbing your own senior leaders in the back the ‘Mohabbat’ you preach to the nation?” he asked.
Late last month, two videos containing allegations against Siddaramaiah were uploaded on YouTube. The former CM obtained an injunction barring the press from reporting on the videos and lodged a police complaint seeking an investigation.
Ashoka also accused the government led by Chief Minister D K Shivakumar of being a helpless spectator to what he described as a “cheap, gutter-level circus”.
“When your own Cabinet ministers expose a web of internal blackmail and betrayal, it proves your administration is rotten to the core,” he told Shivakumar.
“The weight of your own greed and conspiracies is crushing you. The countdown has begun and your days are numbered,” he added.
(PTI News)
