‘Had he improved Varuna in 15 years, he did not have to bring in film stars as face-saver’

Mysore/Mysuru: Even as cinema stars have started campaigning for former Chief Minister Siddharamaiah in his own home turf of Varuna witnessing intense canvassing on war-footing, his opponent Housing Minister V. Somanna took pot-shots at the former CM for depending on film stars to face him.

“Oh how the mighty have fallen! Siddharamaiah, who boasted about visiting the Constituency only on polling day, now seems to be in despair and is desperately bringing in star campaigners to try and gather more people for his campaign,” he said in a tone full of sarcasm. People may come to see the popular star, but it will not convert into votes for him, he said.

“I am happy that Siddharamaiah, who always claims of giving good administration, has been forced to bring film stars to campaign for him to face one Somanna,” he added.

Somanna made these remarks during a road show at Eshwara Gowdanahalli, Biligere, Gejjaganahalli and other villages in the T. Narasipura taluk falling under the Varuna Constituency, yesterday.

“Siddharamaiah has become nervous looking at the support I am getting and he is not the same Siddharamaiah I have seen. I heard film stars Shivarajkumar, ‘Duniya’ Vijay and Ramya are campaigning for him. I can clearly understand Siddharamaiah’s predicament over my contest. There is absolutely no development in Varuna. There is neither a college, nor a hospital and even roads. Yet, Siddharamaiah claims that the people will vote for him. He has brought stars as a face-saver, to salvage a gloomy situation,” Somanna said.

“When he filed his nomination, Siddharamaiah had declared that he would only come to Varuna on the day of the election and would not campaign. But now, he is going on a campaign trail with star campaigners. It is quite evident that Somanna’s presence has led to Siddharamaiah’s desperation. Had he spent time in improving Varuna, in the last 15 years, Siddharamaiah would not have had to bring in the film stars,” added Somanna.

Good rapport with Dr. Raj family

In a media statement regarding Shivarajkumar’s campaign, Somanna said, “I have had a good relationship with the legendary actor Dr. Rajkumar’s family for the past 40 years, and I consider myself to be one of their family  members,” he said.

“After the untimely demise of actor Puneeth Rajkumar, I worked with the Government to build a hospital in his memory and it was even praised by his brother Raghavendra Rajkumar for keeping Puneeth’s memory alive. However, I am perplexed as to why Shivarajkumar, whom I deeply respect, participated in the campaign. I am not concerned about other actors like Ramya and ‘Duniya’ Vijay,” he added.

It may be mentioned here that Somanna took the initiative of building a hospital in his Govindarajanagar Assembly Constituency in Bengaluru and named it after Puneeth Rajkumar.

Shivanna responds to criticism

Responding to Somanna’s comments and the comments of BJP leaders over his campaigning for Siddharamaiah, Shivarajkumar said, “It is my personal choice to campaign for Siddharamaiah and there is nothing political about it. My fellow actor and friend ‘Kichcha’ Sudeep is campaigning for BJP and that’s his personal choice. There is no enmity between us because of our choices. After all this is just a competition, not a war,” he said.

“No one from BJP contacted me to campaign and if they had approached me, I would have campaigned for them too. Moreover, there are innumerable people who continue to serve in the name of Puneeth Rajkumar. But no one goes talking about what they did in Puneeth’s name,” the actor said.