Udupi :  The Congress-Janata Dal (Secular) coalition government in the State would collapse due to its own internal contradictions said Shobha Karandlaje, MP on Monday.

Addressing presspersons  Karandlaje said that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) would not destabilise the State government. But, already, there were fissures between the coalition partners.

The voters of the State had rejected the coalition partners in over 150 Assembly constituencies during the recently concluded parliamentary elections. “If the coalition government cannot give good governance, it should go,” she said.

Karandlaje said that 150 taluks were drought-hit in the State and people were migrating to other places and there was no fodder for animals. But the government had not taken any concrete steps to deal with the situation.

“Instead of working from the Vidhana Soudha, Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy has stayed put in a plush hotel in Bengaluru. Should the governance of the State be carried from a hotel? Is the Vaastu of Vidhana Soudha not conducive to  Kumaraswamy?” she questioned.

To a query, she said that Independent MP from Mandya Sumalatha was unlikely to back the Congress. The BJP had about two lakh votes in Mandya district, which it had transferred to Ms. Sumalatha, she said. To another query, she said that there should be no opposition to learning any new language. But primacy should be given to Kannada in the State, she said.

On the projects she would concentrate in the next five years in Udupi-Chikkamagaluru parliamentary constituency, Ms. Karandlaje said that she would give priority to doubling of rail line and electrification of Konkan Railway and to upgrade State highways into National Highways.

She wanted the Belur-Chikkamagaluru railway line to be extended to the pilgrim centre of Sringeri. She would also take up the issues of arecanut growers and coffee growers.

The issue of compensation to the families of seven fishermen due to the sinking of the fishing boat, Suvarna Tribhuja off Malvan Coast, on December 15, 2018, would be taken up with the new Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, she said.

She also said that she was not disappointed at not being inducted into Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Council of Ministers.

She said that Chemical and Fertilizers Minister D.V. Sadananda Gowda had served as Chief Minister of the State and had been elected as MP four times, while Pralhad Joshi was a four-time MP and Suresh Angadi was a four-time MP from Belagavi.

Mr. Joshi had been inducted as a Cabinet Minister and given the portfolios of Parliamentary Affairs, along with Coal and Mines. Mr. Angadi was made the Minister of State in the Ministry of Railways. “I have been elected as an MP only twice. All the three Ministers are my seniors. I am glad that they have been chosen as Ministers by Mr. Modi,” she said.

To a query, Ms. Karandlaje said that there was no point in Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy starting his Grama Vastavya (village stay) programme. Instead of doing that, he could concentrate on improving administration by going to his office at the Vidhana Soudha regularly.

The Kumaraswamy government was discriminatory and was not releasing funds for the development of three coastal districts as almost all MLAs, barring three, were from the Bharatiya Janata Party, she said.

Raghupati Bhat, MLA, Dinakar Babu, president of Zilla Panchayat, Mattar Ratnakar Hegde, president of the district unit of the BJP, were present.