BJP slams Congress’ “anti-Kannadiga”-ness; calls out Bhuvaneshwari statue cancellation, Kaveri dispute, school uniform contracts

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

BJP on Tuesday slammed the government in a series of tweets, calling it anti-Kannadiga, a rhetoric which ironically the Congress had employed in the recent assembly elections towards the then-incumbent BJP. The saffron party called out the government over several decisions, from cancelling the construction of a statue of Karnataka’s goddess Bhuvaneshwari devi in Bengaluru to getting government school uniforms stitched by a Maharashtra-based company rather than a Kannadiga one.

“Kannada and Kannada identity are just electoral materials, a handkerchief to be used and thrown away for [Chief Minister] Siddaramaiah and the Congress,” the BJP tweeted. The party took offence at the government saying there were no funds for constructing a theme park including Mother Bhuvaneshwari statue at Kalagrama in Bengaluru, while green-flagging the construction of a bronze statue of former PM Rajiv Gandhi.

“It is a rejection of our culture which worships our land as mother, birth, birth land…the money that should have been reserved for mother Bhubaneswari is wasted for the Gandhi family,” said the BJP, which had approved the theme park project when it was in power. The party also attacked the Congress government for what it called its “unholy” alliance with Tamil Nadu’s DMK government over the Kaveri project, after Karnataka agreed to release water to its neighbouring state from the river last week.

The Cauvery river has been a bone of contention between the two states for years, with both states seeing violent protests during a dry spell in 2002. The DMK regime in Tamil Nadu is an ally of the grand old party, and they are both part of the joint opposition front against the BJP for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.