Farmer killed in Haveri was a BJP worker: HDK

Bangalore, Jun 14: Lashing out at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for calling the farmers agitation against shortage of fertilisers and seeds as politically motivated, Janata Dal(S) leader H D Kumaraswamy today said that the farmer killed in the recent Haveri police firing was a worker of the saffron party.

"Chief Minister Yeddyurappa had alleged that the agitation was a political conspiracy against the BJP. But does he know that the killed farmer was a BJP worker. JD(S) never want to take political mileage out of farmers' problems. But I am revealing this to expose the ulterior motives of the BJP," he said.

He asked if the farmers agitation was a political conspiracy, what was the BJP man doing while Haveri was burning. The situation in Dharwad where farmers protested violently a few days before the Haveri incident was much more serious but fortunately no farmer had to give up his life, he said.

Speaking at the 'Introspection' Meeting organised by the party in the wake of its disappointing performance in the recent Assembly election, the former Chief Minister said the BJP government was inept and was adamant to handle the situation.

Mr Yeddyurappa ignored the farmers interests and while he spent all its time in 'luring in' the independents to form the government and appeasing the leaders in Delhi.

"The Chief Minister went to Delhi to appease the central leaders while farmers in the state took to streets due to non availability of farm inputs. He did not have time to speak to the Fertiliser Minister during this first visit. Then he started blaming the Centre for shortage," he alleged.

UNI