Coastal Karnataka is in the throes of communal fires stoked by the BJP
The Sangh parivar in Karnataka has been preparing for December 6. The Mangalore communal violence in October, in which two Muslims were killed, is spoken of as a 'big message' to the Muslim community in the state. When Mangalore was burning, BJP minister Nagaraj Shetty, in charge of the district, reiterated how much he idolised Narendra Modi. Yatras by BJP leaders in the Malnad region, western Karnataka, over the last few months have been done with the purpose of "liberating" Baba Budangiri shrine. In 1999, former Union minister H.N. Ananth Kumar had sworn that the shrine would be the Ayodhya of Karnataka. This time around, with the BJP in power in the state, the parivar feels it is within striking distance.
In October, a revered icon in Karnataka, Tipu Sultan, became the target of the Sangh parivar after the BJP education minister, D.H. Shankara Murthy, painted him as an 'anti-Hindu' and 'anti-Kannada' ruler. These statements had come without any provocation, but the print space it consumed in the Kannada press was unprecedented. And the Ram mandir issue has been successfully revived in the communally sensitive Udipi and Dakshina Kannada districts where roadside meetings in towns and villages, sponsored by the Rama Mandira Nirmana Samarthana Samithi, happen almost everyday. "Nothing explosive may happen on December 6, but the very build-up and the hate campaign that we see in every corner of coastal Karnataka and in parts of Malnad is a well-planned strategy to intimidate the minorities," says Anand Kodimbala, a Mangalore college lecturer.
Such a meeting witnessed by this correspondent right outside the deputy commissioner's office in Mangalore on November 27 went like this: It is 4 pm in the evening, children are coming out of three Christian convents down the road (St Ann's, Carmel and Rosario). In the crowd, there are young girls with hijabs (the city has nearly 40 per cent Muslims) and nuns (20-25 per cent are Christians). In the vicinity there is also a dargah. There are more than 50 Mahindra jeeps with saffron flags parked. Traffic has been blocked. About a thousand people are squatting on the road listening to some astonishing demagoguery by pontiffs of local Hindu maths, including the influential Pejawar Vishvesha Teertha Swamiji.