Bengaluru, Jan 15 (DHNS): Rival BJP factions have been busy making claims and counter claims over a letter written to express displeasure over the conduct of state party president B?S?Yeddyurappa.
On Saturday, a day after the contents of the letter were leaked to the media, the BJP office went into denial mode.
The office of Yeddyurappa insisted that of the 24 leaders who have purportedly signed the letter, 10 of them have denied the knowledge of the letter.
In a WhastApp message to the media, a spokesman of Yeddyurappa’s office said, “Ten leaders whose names were mentioned as signatories have said they were not told about the contents of the letter and hence they were disassociating themselves from the letter.”
However, BJP state general secretary Aravind Limbavali, a close associate of Yeddyurappa, issued a press note saying that the party office has not received any letter.
Limbavali said, “Of the 24 leaders, Vishweshwara Hegde Kageri, Raghunanth Malkapure, Narayanaswamy Bhandge, M?S?Somalingappa, Chandra Naik, Ashwathnarayan, Srikanth Kulkarni and Mahesh Tenginakai have not signed any letter. They were contacted by me and another general secretary, N?Ravikumar. They said their names have been misused in the letter.”
When contacted by DH, Nirmal Kumar Surana, former MLA, said he had submitted a letter to the party president on January 12.
“The letter signed by 24 BJP leaders was submitted to the president’s office on January 12. But I can’t reveal the contents of the letter. I am not sure whether the media has accessed the same letter and published the contents,” he said.
However, Kageri said he has not signed any letter to protest against Yeddyurappa.
“The statement issued by the party is correct. I have not signed any letter,” the leader said.
On Friday, BJP?MLC?M?B?Bhanuprakash had told the media that he had drafted the letter and 16 leaders were signatories to it. The signatories had expressed their discontent over “unilateral” decisions being taken by Yeddyurappa. Even Malkapure had confirmed that such a letter was written to Yeddyurappa.
Sources close to Bhanuprakash on Saturday said that if the differences are not addressed, then the matter would be taken to party national president Amit Shah.
Some signatories have been reluctant to identify themselves fearing disciplinary action by the party, the sources said.