Women’s Group Welcomes Banu Mushtaq to Open Dasara Festivities

The group members including Dr Akkai Padmashali, Dr Vasundhara Bhupathi, Dr Pornima and Dr N Gayatri at a press conference in Bengaluru came in support of Banu Musthaq over controversy surrounding her selection to inaugurate Dasara festivities and stated the row over Banu Mushtaq by opposition parties ‘a highly divisive and communal politics.’

It may be recalled here that leaders of Bharatiya Janata Party, State unit objected to the selection of Banu Mushtaq to inaugurate Dasara opening this year. While scion of erstwhile Mysore royal family and BJP MP Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar demanded a clarification from Banu Musthaq over her past remarks against Goddess Bhuvaneshwari, revered as Mother Kannada, former Mysore-Kodagu Lok Sabha member Pratap Simha filed a Public Interest Litigation in High Court of Karnataka and Banu Musthaq opening Dasara festivities.

Amidst the row, Mysuru District Administration invited her to open Dasara festivities. Dr Akkai Padmashali told the press conference “the group welcomed the Dasara festivities inauguration by Banu Mushtaq” and took a dig at opposition parties saying “Dasara festivities are not their home fest but a State fest.”

The members of ‘Naaveddu Nilladiddare’ took exception to the forces opposing Banu Mushtaq over her religion and they termed the opposition on ones’ religious grounds “amounted to an affront to our culture of coexistence.”

The group pointed out “There was no opposition to Kannada poet Nisar Ahmed opened the Dasara festivities in 2017” and stated “When a distinguished woman also a writer, a lawyer and an activist has been invited to inaugurate Dasara festivities, opposition party leaders are creating a controversy bringing shame to the State.”