Mangalore: Kharge Squarely Blames State Govt For Attack on Christians
Pics by Prajwal Ukkuda
Daijiworld Media Network - Mangalore (MM/SP)
Mangalore, Sep 16: Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee president and leader of the opposition in the legislative assembly Mallikarjun Kharge visited the churches and other places which were targetted by the miscreants and also those where the police used force including caning and lobbing of tear gas shells, to disperse the mobs that were protesting on Monday September 15, against the attack on churches.
Addressing a press conference in the city, Kharge gave vent to his ire on the government, saying that the BJP is directly involved with the attack on innocent Christians. He also accused the policemen of having taken law into their hands and mercilessly beating up protestors. The government should conduct a judicial probe about the caning, through a sitting High Court judge.. The police who beat up the protesting Christians should not be allowed to perform duties until the probe is concluded. The government should take action against them, he demanded.
Kharge stated, that the government had, under the garb of Hindu outfits, unleashed terror on the Catholics and deliberately disturbed peace in the society. The former home minister also came down heavily on the state home minister V S Acharya for failing to take preemptive action in his home district and demanded for his resignation. He hoped, that the home minister will oblige, being a sensitive person. The unfortunate incidents, which were triggered by the government which has sown the seeds of hatred to vitiate the atmosphere of the society and break it up, is not a good omen either for the state or the country, he added.
The policemen have arrested hundreds of protestors on Monday, but how many activists of the BJP and other HIndu outfits, who burnt buses and damaged property during agitations so far, have been arrested?, he wanted to know. Innocent people bore the brunt of the police atrocities. A judicial probe by a commission headed by a sitting High Court Judge should be ordered immediately into the attacks on the churches and subsequent use of brutal force to silence the suffering Christians, he demanded. Kharge also urged the state government to immediately trace the guilty, book them for various offences and ensure that they are not let off without punishment.
The organizations like Srirama Sene, Bajrang Dal etc., are out to disturb peace in the society. They should be banned,he demanded and condemned the government for targetting its own citizens in the name of some Hindu organizations. He also demanded for imposing of a ban on the organizations like Srirama Sene, Bajrang Dal, Vishwa Hindu Parishat etc. Kharge also ridiculed the chief minister Yeddyurappa, by questioning as to whether this is the 'Gujarat Model' administration he had been harping about, which lacks development but has only violence as its agenda. He asserted, that a police state will never be tolerated by the peole of the state.
He visited Permannur, Kulshekhar and Milagres churches and had a discussion with the bishop Aloysius Paul D'Souza, who is recuperating at Fr Muller Hospital.
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