Anti-Hindi row: Activists demand signboards to have 70 per cent Kannada

Bengaluru: The Pro-Kannada organisation Karnataka Rakshana Vedike (KRV) on Friday staged a protest in front of the BBMP (Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike) demanding 70 percent of the language written on any board/signboard or name plate should be in Kannada.

They are also going to submit a memorandum in this regard to the Mayor of the city.

"Our stand is clear. When you use our land and water, give respect to the language of the land also," Pro-Kannada activist Praveen Shetty said.

On July 19, the anti-Hindi agitation was exhibited by the members of the KRV who blackened words written in Hindi on the signboard outside Yeswanthpur metro station.

The members took up the task of blackening the Hindi words written on almost all metro stations, including Jaynagar, Peenya, Deepanjali Nagar, Mysore Road, and Yashwanthpura metro stations.

Not just Hindi, even English faced the heat of pro-Kannada activists in Karnataka earlier.

On July 6, the KRV defaced English and Hindi signage of a restaurant in a mall near Bengaluru's Eco tech park.

After the anti-Hindi Twitter campaign, #NammaMetroHindiBeda ('Our Metro, We don't want Hindi'), Hindi words on the signboards of two Metro stations - Chickpete and Majestic - were covered with paper and taped on July 3.

These metro boards were in Kannada, English and Hindi.

There is another parallel agitation going on in the state regarding demand of a new state flag.

Where on the one hand, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was seen defending the possibility of designing a new flag, the KRV activists have maintained that the the state should continue with its old flag.