Communal problems need political solutions

Citizens: State govt should not ignore communal violence in coast as problem of one dist, it should be considered as attack on entire country

- EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE @ Mangaluru

A GROUP of citizens from Dakshina Kannada district criticised the state government's proposal to launch an Anti-Communal Task Force to rein in the communal forces in Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts, stating that the crisis needs a political solution and not police intervention.

In an open letter to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, Prof Narendra Nayak, Dr Gananatha Shetty Ekkar, Dr Srinivas Kakkilaya and others said the Task Force is the height of stupidity. "What has been created in the coast is a political-social-economic-cultural crisis. What is needed for such a crisis is a political solution, not police intervention. Ironically, the leaders of the ruling party who are supposed to do such politics are the foot soldiers of the abbots and religious leaders who create communalists. This government is looking at secular political activists, independent social activists, writers and thinkers who are fighting against communalism ideologically as enemies in the coast.

Instead of registering cases against communalists, the police department registers FIRs against those who oppose communalism. Even though this has been brought to the notice of the government, a radical change in the police department in the coast has not yet been possible," they said.