The Union Minister of State for Commerce and Industry Nirmala Sitharaman expressed concern over recent violence in Dakshina Kannada and the ‘failure’’ of the State Government to curb it. She said this could affect investments flowing into the State.
Ms. Sitharaman, who is in Mysuru as a vistarak or volunteer in a campaign to reach out to the people, said Karnataka was always an investor-friendly State and the potential of Bengaluru is internationally recognised. ‘’But, if Bengaluru is seen as the capital of a State where such incidents take place and there are law and order issues or people are being killed for ideological reasons with no sufficient action taken to curb it, then it could affect investments,” she said.
Ms. Sitharaman said administrative action should bring greater sense of security and safety. If the State is not strong enough to bring the culprits to justice then investments will suffer and ‘we do not want that to happen’, she said.
Referring to the killing of RSS activists in Mangaluru recently and in Mysuru last year, Ms. Sitharaman said nothing was done to curtail such violence and sufficient action was not taken to nab the suspects or produce them in court.
Ms. Sitharaman claimed that the public response to her door-to-door campaign was overwhelming and people were aware of the development works being taken up the Centre and expressed confidence that the people will stand by the BJP in the assembly elections slated to be held next year.
In reply to a question, Ms. Sitharaman said the concept of vistarak was a nation-wide and not rolled out in anticipation of the elections next year in Karnataka. “I am in Mysuru to spend a day as a Vistarak,” said Mr. Sitharaman, who will also interact with industrialists and entrepreneurs on GST later in the day. Earlier, she also took part in a cleaning campaign at a park under Swachh Bharat Abhiyan and visited a few localities as part of public contact programme.