BENGALURU: With just a couple of months to go before the assembly elections in Karnataka, opposition BJP has renewed its demand for a ban on the Popular Front of India (PFI). The new demand came a day after the BJP government in Jharkhand banned the PFI for its alleged links with the terrorist group Islamic State. Leader of the Opposition in the Karnataka assembly, Jagadish Shettar said, “Already they have dropped the cases against PFI. This is with malafide intention and for political gain. So many Hindu people have died, but the Congress is always supporting PFI. It is their intention to get minority votes.”
Chief Minister Siddaramaiah dismissed the issue saying, “The situation is not here in Karnataka.” He accused the BJP and RSS of creating communal tension and trying to disturb communal harmony. When asked whether the state government would ban PFI, Law Minister TB Jayachandra said, “There should be some proof. If there are positive reports, then only we can think of it. And that applies not just to one institution, but to all.”
RSS worker Rudresh died in October 2016, after he was attacked with machetes in Bengaluru. Police arrested five people within a month, all members of the PFI and its political wing, the Social Democratic Party of India. The Central government ordered a probe a month later, by the National Investigation Agency. In its chargesheet, it said the murder was an act of terrorism. BJP chief Amit Shah who was in the state to campaign earlier this year, for the upcoming assembly polls had accused Chief Minister Siddaramaiah of playing “politics of appeasement”.
Assembly polls are due in Karnataka by May and the BJP is hoping to reclaim the only state in south India that it ruled from 2008 to 2013.
