BJP's Karnataka in-charge Arun Singh on Thursday said that his conversations with party MLAs revolved around development works and did not veer towards change of leadership in the state "even once by mistake".
As Singh arrived in Bengaluru on Wednesday evening, some BJP leaders had described that his three-day stay in Bengaluru would be a "troubleshooting mission", while another section had claimed that "change of leadership in state" would be the primary agenda of a series of meetings to be held by him.
After a day-long meeting with party MLAs at the BJP state headquarters here, Singh told reporters he could hold discussions only with those leaders and MLAs who had sought a prior appointment.
"All these leaders spoke only about measures needed to be taken to strengthen the party in the state and discussion never veered towards change of leadership in the state," he said.
Ruling out the possibility of change of leadership in the state, he said that had he come here to discuss this issue, he would have met all MLAs instead of only those leaders who had sought an appointment.
"The very premise that I have come here to discuss change of leadership itself is a flawed one. There is no such reason to believe that anything needs to change here," he retorted.
He said that party MLAs were working hard at the grassroot level along with party workers during the pandemic and at the top, Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa and his ministers are working hard to find solutions to the issues that the pandemic is throwing on a day to day basis.
Singh said that there could be "one or two such leaders" who might be openly defying party discipline and making such statements but the BJP, being the biggest national party with crores of workers, their statements make no impact.
"BJP state unit President, Nalin Kumar Kateel will take care of those two or three leaders who are making such remarks... all of these leaders have come from other parties and they are not original BJP leaders," he said, in an indirect dig at Vijaypura MLA Basanagouda Patil Yatnal, Tourism Minister C.P. Yogeshwara and MLC, A.H. Vishwanath as these leaders have been openly criticising Yediyurappa and his son, B.Y. Vijayendra's "interference at all levels in the administration" for quite some time now.
"We are collecting enough evidence against these leaders who are trying to malign the image of our party before taking any concrete action," he said.
In response to a question, he said that he gathered more information about the strengths and weaknesses of opposition Congress and Janata Dal-S, "and how they were losing their workers at grassroot level". This would help the BJP in the 2023 elections, he said.
Nearly 40 MLAs, and 30 chairmen of state-run boards and corporations met Singh for one-on-one discussions.
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