CNN Central News & Network–ITDC India Epress/ITDC News Bhopal: Did AICC chief Mallikarjun Kharge’s family get priority over 72 Dalit entrepreneurs in the seniority list for land allotment?
BJP’s Chalavadi T Narayanaswamy, leader of the opposition in Karnataka Legislative Council, who on August 27 petitioned the Governor Thawar Chand Gehlot to dismiss IT-BT minister Priyank Kharge from the state cabinet, has alleged Karnataka Industrial Areas Development Board (KIADB) allotted the land in a haste – within a month to favour the Kharge family.
The Siddaramaiah government in Karnataka is once again facing allegations of corruption and nepotism in the allotment of land. After Siddaramaiah, it is now Rajya Sabha member Mallikarjun Kharge and his son Karnataka IT-BT minister Priyanka Kharge who are under the scanner over the allotment of five acres of land in Bengaluru to a trust run by the Kharge family.
Earlier, BJP leader and Rajya Sabha member Lahar Singh Siroya had alleged that Siddhartha Vihar Trust run by the Kharge family has been allotted five acres of the 45.94 acres in the Hi-tech Defence and Aerospace Park by Karnataka Industrial Area Development Board (KIADB) under the Scheduled Caste (SC) quota in March this year.
“When did Kharge family turn into aerospace entrepreneurs to be eligible for KIADB’s civic amenities (CA) site? How did industries minister MB Patil allot this land?,” demanded Siroya adding that the Trust comprised Mallikarjun Kharge, his wife Radhabai, his son-in-law Radhakrishna and sons Priyank and Rahul.
Launching a fresh attack on the Congress government, Narayanaswamy said, “The allotment of land was made in haste and by flouting the norms. Some rules were changed to commercial site into civic amenity (CA) site.” The process of site allotment takes months. But the KIADB completed the process in one month just ahead of Parliamentary elections,” alleged the MLC.