BENGALURU: The Karnataka government has ordered a police probe into the Nagamangala KSRTC driver Jagadish’s suicide attempt on Thursday for being transferred from his home depot, wherein he had named agriculture minister and local MLA N Cheluvarayaswamy in his suicide note.
Jagadish had tried to take the extreme step by consuming pesticide on Wednesday and was rushed to BGS hospital in Mandya before being shifted to a private hospital in Mysuru.
Home minister G Parameshwara informed the legislative assembly, after the JD(S) and BJP expressed their furore over the KSRTC driver’s suicide note allegedly naming Cheluvarayaswamy as being instrumental in taking the drastic decision, that a senior police officer will probe the reasons behind the death of the driver and a report will be submitted in this regard.
"We will appoint a senior police officer to probe the suicide attempt and will involve even the transport department on why the decision was taken by the driver. The report will then be submitted to the government," said Parameshwara.
Earlier, the JD(S) had taken a strong opposition to Cheluvarayaswamy continuing as a minister in the government since he was named in the suicide note by the driver-cum-conductor in the KSRTC.
"It is all politically motivated and the minister tried to influence the driver-cum conductor to shift the allegiances of his wife, who is a gram panchayat member, from the JD(S) to Congress to vote for the GP president post of Kanthapura for which he was transferred," claimed Kumaraswamy.
He said the KSRTC employee was struggling for his life and any probe by the government, if it has to be independent, has to have the agriculture minister resign from his post.
"If the probe clears his name then we have no problems in him being re-inducted into the cabinet. Precedence is already there in the case of former RDPR minister K S Eshwarappa when he was asked to resign after being named by a contractor in his suicide," said the former CM.
To this Cheluvarayaswamy responded and said that all 12 members in the Kanthapura GP were JD(S) supporters and did not have any Congress influence to elect the president for the panchayat.
"Furthermore, it was Kumaraswamy who tried to stop the family from shifting the critical patient from Mandya to a better facility in Mysuru or Bengaluru for reaping political dividends from the incident. I neither influenced the transfer of the employee from Nagamangala nor did I ask the transport minister to do so. It was an administrative decision at the divisional level and I in fact stayed the transfer after the boy’s uncle spoke to me," defended Cheluvarayaswamy.
The agriculture minister went to the extent of accusing the former JD(S) MLA Suresh Gowda of trying to stop the ambulance in Nagamangala in the middle of the night to politicise the entire issue.
"Soon after which a police escort was provided for it to be moved," claimed the minister.
The situation was further complicated after the BJP, which had raised the issue earlier in the day and rejected the response given by the transport minister of a departmental probe, also joined the JD(S) and demanded a probe into the entire incident with both the parties jumping into the well amid acrimonious war of words between the JD(S) leaders and Congress government.
The speaker U T Khader decided to adjourn the house for 10 minutes and called for a meeting of all the three party leaders to cool tempers.
Soon after the house commenced, Parameshwara’s response was accepted by the opposition and the demand for resignation of Cheluvarayaswamy was shelved by the JD(S).
