Mangaluru : Chief Whip of the Government in Legislative Council Ivan D’Souza on Thursday said that Mangaluru may be the next city after Bengaluru to open Indira Canteen, following a commitment in this regard from Chief Minister Siddaramaiah.

D’Souza said he has submitted the proposal to the chief minister in the presence of AICC vice president Rahul Gandhi, during his visit to Bengaluru on Wednesday to launch Indira Canteen in the capital. The canteen could be a reality at least by November, he added.

He said, the BJP’s plan to launch a series of protests against Congress-led state government in the coming days.

Addressing reporters at the party office here, D’Souza said, “BJP national president Amit Shah, who caught the party leaders in the state supine, took them to task for hours only to sharpen their fangs against Congress. The saffron party leaders who had almost given up for being devoid of ideas have resorted to ‘Vidhana Soudha Chalo’ as an eye-washing tactic.”

Such is the bankruptcy on the part of BJP that they are demanding the resignation of both Energy Minister D K Shivakumar and Small Scale Industries Minister Ramesh Jarkiholi, whose houses were raided by taxmen in the recent past. While the raid on Shivakumar’s premises is still fresh in the minds of people, Jarkiholi’s case is quite stale, as it happened several months ago. Moreover, a mere raid cannot conclude the duo as corrupt, as if there are proven cases of tax evasions, the IT department will bind them to correct their checks and balances, he defended.

He said BJP has already lost its track and that there will be no impact of either Prime Minister Narendra Modi or Shah on the electorate here.