Hubballi: In an attempt to shed his anti-Lingayat image and revive the party base in North Karnataka after the desertion of hordes of leaders in the region, State JD(S) president H.D. Kumaraswamy embarked on a five-day padayatra from Dharwad to Belagavi on Thursday.
Mr Kumaraswamy offered tribute to the Chennamma statue and took out a 4 km grand procession to Unkal lake. Later, he visited as many as 10 villages in Dharwad taluk before beginning his padayatra from Tadakod village. He visited Hebballi village where thousands of devotees had converged for the Goddess fair being held after a gap of 75 years. He started his padayatra at 5 pm from Tadakod village along with several leaders including Basavaraj Horatti, Y.S.V. Datta, Bandeppa Kashempur and a few other legislators of North Karnataka.
He concluded the first day of the padayatra at Kittur after a 15-km trek. Legislators from the old Mysuru region were conspicuous by their absence but Mr Kumaraswamy claimed that they were busy in the elections to the posts of gram panchayat presidents and vice-presidents.
His speeches centered around the problems of farmers and those of sugarcane growers in particular. "The government is trying to mislead farmers, its move to auction sugar stocks to pay their dues is a wasteful exercise. No one is coming forward to buy the seized sugar. The government should pay the dues to sugarcane growers from the exchequer and recover it later by selling the sugar ", Mr Kumaraswamy said.
