Bengaluru: Communal unrest, which was simmering in Dakshina Kannada district for the last two weeks, aggravated on Saturday as pro-Hindu organisations took out the funeral procession of RSS activist Sharath Madivala, who was stabbed by unidentified assailants on Thursday night. Sharath died at a private hospital late on Friday evening.
The procession was taken out despite ban orders under Section 144. As it reached B.C. Road, around 20 km from Mangaluru, people from a community threw stones and the police had to resort to a lathicharge to disperse the violent crowd. One person, who was injured in the caning, has been hospitalised.
Mr Ganesh Karnik, a BJP member in the Legislative Council, said, “The procession from Mangaluru to B.C. Road was not planned. It was a spontaneous decision of the people. It started peacefully and we had requested the police to provide adequate security. But when it reached B.C. Road round 2.45 pm, a section of the people started throwing stones at the procession,” he said.
Mr Karnik blamed district in-charge minister Ramanath Rai for the incident. “From the beginning, he has not handled the communal situation well and has allowed it to aggravate. Bantwal taluk was tense for the last 3-4 days after a stabbing incident at Kalladka.
We held a protest rally on Friday at B.C. Road, and it was peaceful. But on Saturday, because of stone throwing, the entire region is tense,” he said.
The police have imposed ban orders in four taluks of Dakshina Kannada district for the last one-and-a-half months. Mr Karnik defended the procession despite the ban orders, saying that the administration should not have allowed a public rally by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah in Mangaluru on Friday too.
Mr Karnik warned that the communally tense situation could get worse as the modus operandi behind the killing of Sharath Madivala is the same as in the murders of Rudresh and Prashanth Poojari, who were killed in Bengaluru and Moodbidre over the last two months.
BJP for NIA probe
Chikkamagaluru MP Shobha Karandlaje demanded a probe by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) into the killing of over 30 BJP and RSS workers in Karnataka over the last four years.
Ms Karandlaje said, “I called up Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh and explained to him the situation in coastal Karnataka. I have also written to him seeking a NIA probe into all the murders,” she said. She alleged that PFI and KFD were behind the murders of RSS and BJP workers in the state and sought a ban on these organisations. She demanded that Dakshina Kannada in-charge minister Ramanath Rai and Food and Civil Supplies minister U.T. Khader be sacked from the state cabinet for triggering communal incidents in Mangaluru. She also demanded the immediate arrest of the culprits behind Sharath Madivala’s murder.
