‘Brewing discontent’ in BJYM erupts in protest over murders

The wave of Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BYJM) resignations that followed Nettaru’s murder, party workers said, was the manifestation of problems, which has deep roots and was last kindled with the killing of Harsha Jingade or Harsha Hindu in Shivamogga in February this year.

Pent-up anger and a feeling of being let down, among other factors, have been simmering within the Yuva Morcha of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Karnataka after the brutal murder of worker Praveen Nettaru, a 32-year-old from Bellare in Dakshina Kannada, according to party workers and political observers.

Protesters raised slogans against the BJP government in the state and demanded action against those behind the murder of worker Praveen Nettaru in Dakshina Kannada. (PTI)

The wave of Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BYJM) resignations that followed Nettaru’s murder, party workers said, was the manifestation of problems, which has deep roots and was last kindled with the killing of Harsha Jingade or Harsha Hindu in Shivamogga in February this year.

“It was not like we planned the resignations but our elected representatives were not paying us any attention. Harsha’s murder happened, and there was no justice there. Such things should not happen, and to get our leaders to be a little more proactive, we thought by giving in our resignations, they will act faster,” Sandeep Haravinagndi, the district president of Chikmagalur BYJM, told HT.

He added that the ‘five-star’ treatment given to Harsha’s murders in jail was not justice, referring to recent viral pictures, which purportedly showed the accused talking on mobile phones and making video calls inside Bengaluru’s Parappana Agrahara Central Prison.

The statements by former Karnataka minister and senior BJP leader KS Eshwarappa, calling those resigning from their posts in protests as “immature” and easily replaceable have not helped the BJP as workers tried to lay siege to his house in Shivamogga.

The allegations made by public works contractor Santosh Patil, an active member of the Hindu Vahini and the BJP, before he allegedly died by suicide in April against Eshwarappa of demanding commissions, added to the anger of right-wing workers who believe that these politicians will make no concessions even for their own.

However, analysts said that the problem is deeper, adding that much of this is very unlikely to have any electoral impact on the BJP, who are hoping to tide this over with the announcements to form a commando force and the higher education minister (Dr CN Ashwath Narayan) stating that “the time for encounters has come”.

Professor Phani Rajanna, an academic and expert on communal politics, said that there are underlying factors, including poverty, lack of employment and an idea of a social identity that claims to break the caste mould.

“They feel that only the youngsters from the backward classes are getting their hands dirty, getting murdered and getting very little in return. Many of these youngsters get some position within the organisation but rarely get a party ticket for even local body elections,” Rajanna said.

On July 29, Congress leader Priyank Kharge released a video of an interview of a former BJP leader Satyajit Surathkal, in which the latter levels allegations against the BJP of funding and strengthening the SDPI, adding to the dissent brewing around the party.

“It is very sad that to defeat the Congress politically and become more powerful themselves, a party that has come to power with the support of Hindutva (an apparent reference to BJP), is strengthening the SDPI (Social Democratic Party of India, the political arm of the PFI) by giving them money and funding their candidates,” Surathkal is heard saying in a Kannada interview to Mangaluru-based Daijiworld in four months ago.

The BJP dismissed the allegations, with one legislator calling Surathkal a ‘disgruntled’ for not being given a ticket to contest the 2018 assembly elections from Mangaluru North and the same being given to a dentist who was formerly with the Janata Dal (Secular).

Capt (Retd) Ganesh Karnik, the spokesperson for the BJP, said that he can understand the anger of people like Suratkal and its young workers but allegations that the party supports the likes of SDPI are wrong as it serves no use to them politically.

“These are observations made by people in moments of anguish. I deeply sympathise with them and appreciate their anguish. We have lost one of our most devout Karyakarta (workers). So, there is a lot of anguish that our party is in power at the Union and the state and the entire coast is BJP then why all this? But in these moments of crisis, we fail to look into reality. They want to disturb Hindu unity. To disturb that, knowing fully well, that if a murder of this kind takes place, it is a sinister design, people who come from outside the state. And it was not a worker who did not have a threat and was not an important worker and just a Yuva Morcha district committee member. There could be that during the Covid time, he promoted fish trade among Hindus and this could have disturbed a few people but, it’s a minor cause,” he said.

He added that to kill a person who is not very high up in the ranks was part of a ‘jihadi mindset’.

The workers who resigned are firm in their resolve to get their government to act and that no one has reached out to them yet has fuelled a feeling of distrust within the ranks as some young workers believe that they are left to defend the ideology, while politicians prioritise politics over their beliefs.

“If strict legal action is not taken for such acts in Karnataka, one day there will be only leaders in the party and no party workers,” said another party worker, who did not want to be identified.

The leader of the opposition in the upper house of the state legisalture, BK Hariprasad, on Sunday visited the home of Praveen Nettaru even as people started chanting anti-Congress slogans.

“These people say they will protect religion and those in power should send their children out with guns to fight. Why should they sacrifice innocents, people from backward classes and Dalits? People who make speeches and sit in Vidhana Soúdha don’t die. People who die are from these small villages who have to work for a living and are those who have faith in their religion,” Hariprasad said.