I’m not responsible for madrassa remark of MLA-uncle: Tejasvi Surya

BENGALURU: Tejasvi Surya, the Bengaluru South MP and national president of BJP youth wing BJYM, said on Wednesday that he never sought to give a communal angle to the bed-for-bribe scam that he claimed to have exposed a day earlier. Excerpts from an interview with TOI.
Exposing a scam is fine, but why did you read out the Muslim names selectively? It has communalised the issue.
Certainly not. Those who want to divert attention from the humongous scam, which claimed hundreds of lives, are trying to turn the issue into a communal one. Coronavirus is such a secular virus that it infects people from all religions. I would not be such a stupid to see a communal angle in a scam that magnified the proportion of the Covid crisis. When I went to the BBMP war room, the officials said those 17 workers had been removed on some charges. I only read out their names and asked on what basis they were appointed.
But your uncle Ravi Subramanya, a BJP MLA, shouted at BBMP officials, asking them whether these workers had been taken to a madrassa or corporation…
You need to ask him why he made that statement. He accompanied me to the BBMP war room, as did a couple of other MLAs. I am not responsible for what he said.
Following your admonishment of BBMP officials, social media went berserk and a few people even dubbed the officials from minority communities as terrorists…
I did not call anyone a terrorist, and I am not responsible for what is doing the rounds on social media. I heard that some people, including opposition leaders, are accusing me of pulling off a gimmick to divert the attention from the Chamarajanagar tragedy and BJP’s setback in the assembly polls. Those who are making these allegations want to divert the attention from the scam.
The allegation is that your people wanted to control the war rooms and you were angry since BBMP officials did not oblige in terms of allotting beds…
It is not important why I was angry. It is a fact that the scam has taken place, and people involved should be punished. We observed that the software created for bed booking is fraudulent and designed so that it helps the manipulators. I only insisted on bringing in reforms in the system. I had requested BS Yediyurappa to rope in Nandan Nilekani to revamp the web portal and the chief minister obliged.
You have not criticised the BJP ministers in charge of eight BJP zones.
The ministers would not be knowing about it since it is a technology issue. I also came to know about it only now after receiving a flood of complaints. Now that the ministers know about it, they will take care of it.
Why didn’t you lodge a police complaint?
The government has taken cognisance of the scam and handed it over to CCB for investigation. I am sure the truth will come out and the guilty will be punished.