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Ex-BJP MLA issues veiled threats towards Muslim community
A former BJP MLA on Monday issued a veiled threat directed towards the Muslim community, after his defeat in the Karnataka assembly polls.
Former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator from Hassan City constituency Preetham Gowda on Monday issued a veiled threat directed towards the Muslim community, holding them responsible for his defeat against Janata Dal(Secular) candidate HP Swaroop in the recently concluded Karnataka assembly elections.
In a widely shared video on social media, Gowda is heard threatening “one community” and purportedly saying he would show “his power.”
“I have worked for five years while others were sleeping. But people from that one community have shown us. In the coming days, we’ll show what we are... I honestly tried to take all communities along with love and faith...,” Gowda is heard saying in the video, without taking any names.
HT could not independently verify the veracity of the video.
In December last year, another video of Gowda had gone viral, in which he was heard threatening Muslim constituents to vote for him or else he “wouldn’t work for them”. He went on to say that he treated Muslims with “love and affection”, but the community has “ditched” him.
In the assembly polls, HP Swaroop, who got the JD(S) ticket following differences within the Deve Gowda family, defeated BJP MLA Preetham Gowda in Hassan with a margin of 7,854 votes. The region is considered a stronghold of JD(S). In the 2018 assembly elections, Gowda had defeated Prakash by 13,006 votes.
In the run-up to the polls, the constituency attracted attention due to difference within former prime minister HD Deve Gowda’s family over finalising a candidate for the seat.
Bhavani Revanna, wife of former minister HD Revanna, had announced that the party leadership had decided to field her from the constituency.
However, former CM and JD(S) leader HD Kumaraswamy, had declared that he would field an “ordinary party worker” from the seat.
The rift within the Gowda family over the Hassan ticket had widened to the extent that Kumaraswamy invoked the battle of “Kurukshetra” from the epic Mahabharata to allege that some “Shakunis” — a character from the epic — were trying to brainwash his brother Revanna.
