“Am I slipper that can be used and thrown away when Siddaramaiah pleases?" actor-turned-politician MH Ambareesh said on Tuesday.
Addressing the media a day after he resigned as MLA, Ambareesh vented his anger at Chief Minister Siddaramaiah who dropped him from the Cabinet along with 13 other ministers in a major, long-pending reshuffle.
Ambareesh said that he was not just well-known within Karnataka, he also had international standing. Stating that Siddaramaiah’s actions had humiliated him, he threatened to quit the party. However, he said he has not thought of joining any other party.
Defending his tenure as housing minister, Ambareesh urged people to check his work for themselves by filing RTI applications. “If there are people who think I have done little during my tenure as housing minister, let them go and check the papers. At least, I wasn’t involved in lobbying like ‘others’ are. I am clean and have worked only for the people,” he said.
He was referring to criticism on social media, and jokes that people knew Ambareesh was a minister only because he quit as MLA.
His supporters however, blocked a highway and two people in Mandya attempted to immolate themselves.
Indicating his discontentment over being sacked, the 63-year-old said, “If the chief minister had just given me a call to tell me that I have served three years and that another MLA deserved a chance, it would have been amicable of him. It is a basic courtesy one shows to someone who has had a clean record and set an example for the government.”
Ambareesh told The News Minute that he had started many housing projects, built canals and worked to establish new colleges.
Asked whether the move to remove him from the cabinet was Siddaramaiah’s strategy to increase the number of ministers who belong to the Lingayat community to compete with BJP in 2018 elections, Ambareesh said, “That is politics. And there is nothing wrong even if that was the motive. But there is a way to do everything.”
Many party leaders, including opposition leaders have been disappointed with Ambareesh's resignation. The former minister said that he received many calls from his party as well as the opposition including JD (S) supremo HD Deve Gowda. Both Ambareesh and Gowda are Vokkaligas.