K'taka Cong opposes land allotment to Chanakya University

Bengaluru, Sep 23 (IANS) Leader of Opposition in Karnataka Siddaramaiah has urged the ruling BJP to drop the decision to grant hundreds of acres of land at cheaper price to Centre for Education and Social Studies to establish Chanakya University.Siddaramaiah addressed a joint press conference with state Congress (KPCC) President D.K. Shivakumar on Wednesday and expressed his anger against the decision of Karnataka to transfer land at a very cheap price. He has said that they will seek legal remedies against the decision.Siddaramaiah interacting with the media said, "All the members of CESS are from RSS. This is an organisation that promotes the idea of Manu. They want to re-establish the Varnashrama system in our society."The BJP government has hurriedly passed Chanakya Varsity bill on voice note in Tuesday's assembly without giving opportunity to debate and discuss.CESS does not have any prior experience of managing educational institutions and also does not have any infrastructure to start a university. The government should clarify on what criteria has the land been allocated to them, Siddaramaiah asserted.The BJP government had called for a cabinet meeting on April 26, 2021 and had decided to hand over 116 acres in Haralur to CESS. The notified land was acquired by Karnataka Industrial Areas Development Board (KIADB) to establish Aerospace and Defense industries."KIADB had acquired the land at a cost of Rs 1.5 crore per acre and gave compensation of Rs 175 crore to acquire 116 acres. The same land is now being given to CESS at just Rs 50 crore. The current market price is Rs 300-400 crore," he claimed."State BJP government is giving highly priced land to RSS agencies at a cheaper price. It is unfortunate that the government has overlooked all regulations related to the setting up of University and passed a Bill to favour RSS mouthpiece which does not have any experience of running educational institutions. This is a highly criminal & corrupt attempt by the BJP government," Siddaramaiah alleged.At a time when the second wave of Covid was at its peak and the government was starved of funds, B.S. Yediyurappa government called for a cabinet and gifted highly priced land to CESS at a cheaper cost.Even Speaker Vishveshwara Hegde Kageri was partial in his conduct while passing Chanakya varsity bill. He disallowed the leaders of opposition to discuss important issues surrounding the bill."Speaker never listened to our request to allow discussion about this issue. What was the need to pass the bill urgently? Was this related to a public emergency?" he questioned."This is a case of nepotism and I demand the BJP government to scrap the decision to hand over the land to CESS to start Chanakya University as CESS does not have any qualification or eligibility to start an institution," he said.
--IANS mka/shs