A day after BJP MLA from Kagwad, Shrimant Patil claimed that he was "offered money" in 2019 to switch sides from the Congress to the BJP, the Maratha leader from Belagavi did a flip flop on Tuesday, saying his statement was only a "mistake".
Patil's earlier statement came as a shocker to the BJP as it would substantiate that the BJP had offered bribes to rebel legislators' to buy their support. His backtracking on the statement was apparently due to pressure from the party leaders, as the state Assembly is in session and the ruling BJP does not want the opposition parties to corner them on the issue.
"No one approached me either to offer money or to ask me to join the BJP. I went to them on my own. I told them I had come to support them. They asked me why I wanted to support them and if I needed something. I asked them to give me a good portfolio when the BJP government is formed," said Patil maintaining that his statement was in a reply to a question on whether he had taken money from the BJP.
"I told people that nobody had offered me any money. Even if one did, I would never accept it," said Patil.
Earlier, Patil who was in Ainapur village to inaugurate a road project, had claimed that he was offered money during "Operation Kamala (Lotus)".
“They asked me how much money I wanted. But I told them I need no money and instead asked them to give me a suitable portfolio after the government formation. I came to BJP without taking any money,” Patil had said, while expressing hope that he would be accommodated in the Bommai cabinet during the next cabinet expansion.
Patil, an ex-Congress MLA, had resigned along with 16 other Congress and JDS rebels MLAs in July 2019, which led to the collapse of the JDS-Congress coalition government, and paved the way for installing the BJP government under B.S. Yediyurappa. Patil, who won the bypolls in December 2019, was inducted into the Yediyurappa cabinet as minister of minority welfare, handloom and textiles in February 2020, as a "reward" for his "sacrifice". However, Patil was dropped from the cabinet by Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai, who replaced Yediyurappa in July this year.
While the BJP chose to replace six senior ministers, Patil was the lone minister from the bunch of turncoat MLAs to lose the ministerial berth.
Bommai had inducted 23 out of the 29 ministers, who were part of the Yediyurappa cabinet, along with six new faces.
Patil is not the only disgruntled MLA in the BJP as there are at least a dozen ministerial aspirants, including former minister and Gokak MLA Ramesh Jarkiholi (who is embroiled in a sex scandal) and Athani MLA Mahesh Kumatalli, who too belong to Belagavi, which is represented by Shashikala Jolle and Umesh Katti, in the cabinet. In a desperate bid to make it to the cabinet, Patil had tried to play the caste card too and demanded representation for the Maratha community.
Meanwhile, the Congress party is cosying up to Patil, but shying away from fighting the BJP.
Congress MLA from Belagavi Anjali Nimbalkar voiced concern over fellow Maratha (Shrimanth Patil) being denied the cabinet berth. "The BJP has adopted use-and-throw policy in case of Shrimath Patil," said Nimbalkar, adding that the community was backing her demand to induct Patil into the Bommai cabinet.
KPCC chief D.K. Shivakumar tweeted, "Sri Shrimant Patil has spoken the truth. The BJP had indeed attempted to lure Sri Shrimant Patil, a former minister using Operation Kamala. I congratulate him for speaking up on this matter. The ACB must immediately investigate this and take action against those who subvert."
Interestingly, this is not the first time that there has been allegation that the collapse of the JDS-Congress coalition was engineered by the BJP through Operation Kamala.
In February 2019, a leaked audio clip purportedly of a conversation between then state BJP president B.S. Yeddyurappa, BJP MLA from Devadurga Shivangouda Naik, and Sharanagouda, son of JD(S) MLA from Gurmitkal Naganagouda Kandakur, had the BJP leaders urging Sharanagouda to get his father resigned to help BJP topple the Congress-JD(S) coalition government in the state. Naik is purportedly heard telling Sharanagouda that he would be paid Rs 20 crore and an additional Rs 2.5 crore if he travelled to Mumbai to join other rebel Congress and JDS MLAs.
Interestingly, then Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy had ordered a Special Investigation Team probe, which never took off.
In March this year, the Karnataka High Court allowed probe against Yediyurappa in the Operation Kamala case.
In November 2019, ahead of the bypolls, Yediyurappa, in a video recording of his meeting with BJP party workers in Hubballi, appeared to be telling the partymen that the 17 rebel Congress and JDS MLAs had taken a decision to quit not only based on Yediyurappa's assurance, but also because the national president was aware of it.
The Congress took to twitter and dubbed Yediyurappa's purported statement as a "confession" to the immoral defections engineered by the BJP.
