Karnataka CM’s Political Secretary K Govindaraj Sacked Amid Bengaluru Stampede Outrage

Govindaraj has been relieved from the post of political secretary to Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah effective immediately, as per a state government notification.

"The appointment of K Govindaraj as Political Secretary to the Chief Minister is hereby revoked with immediate effect. Accordingly, K Govindaraj is hereby relieved from the post of Political Secretary to the Chief Minister with immediate effect," an official notification said.

Govindaraj's suspension comes less than two days after 11 people were killed in the stampede at M Chinnaswamy Stadium on June 4. However, there has been no official reason for Govindaraj's suspension given to date.

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Meanwhile, sacked political secretary and Congress MLC K Govindaraj broke his silence on claims that he counseled the CM to not hold a grand victory procession for the Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) IPL team, Times of India reported.

Referring to the reports as "misinterpreted", Govindaraj said on Saturday, "I was misconstrued. I never gave the chief minister advice on this. Who am I to give the CM advice?"

And said, he had "no role" in the planning for or making decisions at the felicitation event which ended in tragedy. “I hold no brief on cricketing matters. In fact, I head the Karnataka Olympic Association. It would be inappropriate for me to make any suggestions regarding a cricket celebration,” he said as quoted by TOI.

Following the unfortunate incident, the Karnataka police suspended a number of IPS officers including Bengaluru city police Commissioner B Dayananda.

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Senior IPS officer Seemant Kumar Singh took over the responsibilities of city police commissioner as of Friday.

Defending the suspension of Bengaluru police commissioner B Dayananda and other police officials for the stampede incident outside Chinnaswamy Stadium, CM Siddaramaiah stated, Prima facie everyone who has not appropriately fulfilled their functions have been suspended.

While talking to reporters, he charged the BJP and JD(S) of politicising the issue.

The CM had on Thursday announced the action against Circle Police Inspector of Cubbon Park police station A K Girish, the Assistant Commissioner of Police C Balakrishna, the Deputy Commissioner of Police of central division Shekhar H Tekkannavar, the Additional Commissioner of Police Vikash Kumar Vikash, who looks after the stadium, and the Commissioner of Police Bengaluru city Dayananda, with immediate suspension.

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