"K'taka ministers busy cooking excuses": Congress-JDS duel over investments, traffic woes

Bengaluru (Karnataka) [India], October 16 (ANI): A war of words erupted between the Janata Dal (Secular) and the Congress party on Thursday with the former accusing the latter of failing to secure investments for Karnataka and resolve Bengaluru's traffic woes. Nikhil Kumaraswamy, JD(S)' state youth wing president, accused Congress ministers in Karnataka for "cooking up excuses" and not getting investments, creating jobs, and other facilities in the state.
He compared the situation of Karnataka to the recent investments of Google's AI hub in Andhra Pradesh, taking a jibe that it now seems that "Andhra's spice burns hotter than Bengaluru's asphalt these days."
Andhra is cooking up investments, while Karnataka's ministers are busy cooking excuses. Andhra is attracting Google; Karnataka's ministers are threatening people who use it. No roads, no funds, no jobs, but just reels, real estate, and rhetoric!", the JD(S)' state youth wing president said in a post on X.
The JD(S) leader's comments comes just hours after Andhra Pradesh IP minister Nara Lokesh took a veiled jibe at Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar amid their banter over Google's pledge to invest USD 15 billion over the next five years to establish a one-gigawatt-scale Artificial Intelligence (AI) hub in Visakhapatnam.
Sharing an X post, Lokesh referred to the investments in the state as "spicy," alleging envy among neighbouring states, "They say Andhra food is spicy. Seems some of our investments are too. Some neighbours are already feeling the burn."
Hitting back at Kumaraswamy, the Karnataka Congress said that instead of the accusations, the state is "India's investment magnet" getting around Rs 54,427 crore in Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in FY 2023-24.
"No jobs, no funds" in Karnataka? Sit down, bro. We're here to educate you, with facts, not feelings. Karnataka is India's investment magnet. ₹54,427 crore ($6.57B) FDI in FY23-24. From semiconductors to EVs, from startups to smart infra, we're cooking with real billions," the Congress party wrote.
The party also highlighted how startups in Bengaluru have raised over USD 3.5 Billion across 285 deals, various companies like Flipkart, Groww, AMD, Lam Research, Foxconn, Volvo, and multiple others investing in agriculture, telecom and more, leading to the state holding around 20-22 per cent of India's total FDI stock.
"So, the only unemployment crisis here, bro, seems to be yours. After three failed launches, you finally got a "job" in your family business, which by the way, economists call disguised unemployment," the party wrote.
While blaming the Central government for allegedly making Karnataka lose thousands of crores in investment, the party added, "And since you all love "crying for Karnataka", maybe ask your father, Kumaraswamy, to cry for the industries and opportunities that were diverted to Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh because of the Union Government's manipulative interference. Karnataka lost thousands of crores worth of investment because Delhi chose politics over fairness."
There were a few more posts exchanged between the Kumaraswamy and Congress, with the former criticising pothole ridden roads of Bengaluru, and the recent traffic jam which happened at the city's Outer Ring Road (ORR).
"Looks like bro got stuck in an ORR traffic jam and rage-tweeted this. If "launch failures" were an Olympic sport, your Supremo (CM Siddaramaiah) would've won gold, 47 times! He's the only leader who's been "launched" more times than Bengaluru's startups, except none of his launches ever take off. Love the stats dump! But tell that to Bengalureans stuck in traffic, dodging potholes, and watching startups shift out. Investors built confidence in Karnataka's talent, not in Congress's governance", the JDS leader posted.
Google on Tuesday announced a massive investment of USD 15 billion over the next five years to establish one gigawatt-scale Artificial Intelligence (AI) hub in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, the company's largest AI hub outside the United States.
The announcement came during Google's 'Bharat AI Shakti' event in New Delhi. (ANI)