Two held for disrupting Eshwarappa's felicitation

 Two persons, Manjunath and Prakash, were arrested on the charges of disrupting a felicitation ceremony for Deputy Chief Minister K S Eshwarappa organised by the Vipra Vedike, a Brahmin’s forum, at the Gayathri convention hall here on Tuesday evening.

According to sources, the felicitation ceremony for Eshwarappa, who is also the BJP candidate from Shimoga City constituency, was slated to be held at 6:30 pm.

The Vedike had planned to honour Eshwarappa for providing financial assistance to 26 Brahmin associations of the region.

Even before the commencement of the event, a group of eight to 10 persons arrived at the convention hall and started raising slogans against the programme.

They said the Brahmins’ convention held in Shimoga last year had passed a resolution asking all community members to back the candidate from the community during the elections.

Leaders of various political parties belonging to Brahmin community, including State BJP vice-president M B Bhanuprakash, had taken the oath that they would abide by the resolution, in the presence of 21 seers.

So, Brahmins must back the candidate from the community (K B Prasannakumar of the Congress) in the polls, the protestors said. 

They said it was not fair to honour Eshwarappa (a Kuruba) when the elections are round the corner. If the felicitation is inevitable, candidates of all parties should be feted, they said.

Police rushed to the spot when they were raising slogans against Eshwarappa. The police then arrested Manjunath and Prakash for arguing with the police. The programme then went off smoothly.