A file photo of Minister for Health and Family Welfare Dinesh Gundu Rao addressing the Karnataka legislative council at Vidhana Soudha, in Bengaluru on July 15, 2024. | Photo Credit: Murali Kumar K
The Directorate of Enforcement (ED) is coercing those arrested and questioned in connection with the alleged Maharshi Valmiki Scheduled Tribes Development Corporation scam to name senior functionaries of the government of Karnataka, including the Chief Minister and Deputy Chief Minister, in a bid to destabilise the Congress government in the State, alleged Revenue Minister Krishna Byre Gowda.
He made this allegation at a media conference hosted jointly by five senior Ministers of the government of Karnataka on July 18 before the legislature convened for the ongoing session. Other ministers at the media conference were K.J. George, Priyank Kharge, Dinesh Gundu Rao and Santosh Lad.
On July 17, the ED had claimed that ₹90 crore was diverted from the corporation, and a part of the money was used to buy a ‘significant quantity of liquor just before the general elections’. It claimed that money from the corporation was diverted to 18 bank accounts in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, and later laundered into several bank accounts.
Dinesh Gundu Rao: ‘Suspects assured of protection by ED if they name big people’
Health and Family Welfare Minister Dinesh Gundu Rao alleged, “The ED has entered the probe, not with an intention to get to the truth, but with a malafide intention to destabilise the Congress government in Karnataka. The agency is coercing those it has questioned to name senior functionaries of the State Government, asking them to say the money was used for election expenditure in Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and in Ballari in Karnataka. We have reliably learnt that suspects have been assured of protection by the agency if they name big people, but they have also been threatened that if they don’t, they will attract the full wrath of the agency.
“We are here to tell the people of Karnataka and the country what the ED is up to. ED is no longer acting as an investigative wing of the Union Government, but as a political wing of the BJP.”
‘Why is ED not interested in alleged scams during tenure of BJP government in Karnataka?’
Rural Development and Panchayat Raj Minister Priyank Kharge said that the reputation of the ED is well-known. “In the last 10 years, ED has raided 121 politicians, of which 115 are from the opposition. Of this, less than 25% of cases have gone for prosecution. The ED, that has come to probe the Valmiki Corporation case, did not show interest in any scam during the BJP tenure in Karnataka. A former MLC of the BJP has been arrested for misappropriation of funds in D. Devaraj Urs Truck Terminal. Scams were reported at Bhovi Development Corporation, in the APMC, and Karnataka Handloom Corporation, among others. Why hasn’t the ED shown similar interest in any of these cases?”
