Budget & after: HDK slams BJP for declaring temple on poll eve

NT Correspondent

Ramanagara: Former Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy on Saturday lambasted Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai for announcing a Ram temple on the Ramadevara betta hill in Ramanagara less than two months away from the Assembly elections.

The JD(S) legislature party leader said that he would have accepted the announcement if it had happened when BJP first assumed power in 2019 but this plan was disclosed so close to the elections. Not wanting to hurt religious sentiments, Kumaraswamy qualified his statement with the claim that since BJP would not come to power, he would build the temple.

“They haven’t even decided on a location (for the temple) yet. They have tentatively said Ramadevara betta. Some of it is forest land. There are several restrictions. These matters should be cleared first. If they had said this and built the Ram Mandira three years ago, I would have congratulated them. Next month, election dates will be declared.

Before that, will they be able to clear the legal hurdles?” Kumaraswamy said. “It’s an election gimmick. It’s not just the Ram Mandir. There are other such promises in the Budget,” he said, adding that there was no point to the allocations since the saffron party would be voted out and a new government would formulate their own Budget.

“They might have announced Rama Mandira but I will build it,” he added. In December, Ramanagara district in-charge Minister CN Ashwath Narayan had requested Bommai to constitute a development committee to build a temple at Ramadevara Betta similar to the one in Ayodhya back. Ramanagara, which is a neighbouring district of Bengaluru is part of the Vokkaliga-dominated Old Mysuru region.

It is a JD(S) bastion, which BJP and Congress are trying to breach. Anita Kumaraswamy is the incumbent MLA from Ramanagara but she has announced that Nikhil Kumaraswamy will be contesting from Ramanagara in the upcoming Assembly polls.