Opposition targets me because it doesn’t know what development is: Anant Kumar Hegde

Karwar, Apr 3: Union Minister of State for Skill Development Entrepreneurship Anant Kumar Hegde, along with his supporters, took out a procession in Karwar on Tuesday before filing his nomination papers for the elections to the Uttara Kannada Lok Sabha Constituency as BJP candidate.

The former Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar and MLAs and MLCs and BJP leaders accompanied the Union Minister in the procession from the BJP office in Karwar to the office of the Deputy Commissioner of Uttara Kannada and Election Officer.

Accompanied by his family members, Mr Hegde earlier offered puja at the Mahadev Temple in Baad locality of the city before taking out the procession. Sloganeering in support of Mr. Hegde and Prime Minister Narendra Modi was heard throughout the procession.

Addressing party workers at a function in Karwar on Tuesday, Mr. Hegde said that he has published a list of development works he had carried out and the details had also been hosted on his official website. “Anyone can visit the website to check the details,” he said.

Mr. Hegde argued that Uttara Kannada with an abundance of green treasure was not a district where urbanisation and industrialisation could be taken up.

He said that only green industries could come up in the district and without understanding the ground reality, the Opposition leaders who do not know what development meant were making allegations.

Taking a dig at Janata Dal (Secular), Mr. Jagadish Shettar said that that party was not just a father-and-sons party but a party of father, sons, grandsons and daughter in-laws.

Mr. Shettar accused Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy of not keeping his promise and sending recovery notices to farmers even after announcing a farm loan waiver. The reason for Revenue Minister R.V. Deshpande’s lack of interest in getting Uttara Kannada seat for Congress was that he had already realised that the Congress would not win the election there, he said.

MLAs Roopali Naik, Sunil Naik, Dinakar Shetty, Mahantesh Doddagoudar, MLC S.V. Sankanur, president of the party’s district unit K.G. Naik and other leaders participated.

Mr. Anantkumar Hegde has won five times from the constituency, and on Tuesday he filed his nomination papers for the seventh time.