HUBBALLI, 13 JULY

Union Minister Pralhad Joshi has accused Congress-led state governments, particularly in the State, of failing to address high job vacancy rates due to precarious financial conditions.

In response to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s criticism of the BJP government's employment record, Joshi suggested that Gandhi’s remarks are based on superficial feedback from advisers rather than a thorough understanding of the situation. “Gandhi doesn’t always go into details. He gives reactions based on the feedback he receives,” he stated.

Joshi claimed that the central government is actively working to boost employment, revealing that since 2022, the government has regularly hosted Rozgar Melas, recruiting between 50,000 to 100,000 individuals each month. “In the last two-and-a-half years, over 750,000 people have been hired into various government departments,” he noted.

Joshi pointed out that the State government, by contrast, has failed to fill over 200,000 vacancies, attributing this inaction to its inability to pay current employees on time.

CM POWER STRUGGLE

With a Congress MLA claiming that the BJP was planning to topple the State government and has prepared a list to target 55 legislators through central agencies, Joshi hit back, alleging that "horse trading" was on in the ruling party itself.

Congress MLA from Hungund Vijayanand Kashappanavar on Saturday claimed that the BJP had a list of 55 Congress MLAs that they would blackmail with ED or CBI raids if they didn’t join the saffron party.

Reacting to Kashappanavar's claims, Joshi said, "Has he (Kashappanavar) done anything (wrong) to come on the ED list? Those who have done wrong will come under ED's notice, not others."

He claimed that CM Siddaramaiah and his deputy DK Shivakumar had begun horse trading within the Congress MLAs to garner support.

"Siddaramaiah had recently said that Shivakumar doesn't have the support of many MLAs, so both of them, to garner support on their respective sides, are using their money power. Both of them who are ready to buy MLAs are strong there (in Congress), so there is no chance for us (BJP) to enter and we don't want to indulge in such things," Joshi said. “It is they who are involved in horse trading.”