Did BS Yeddyurappa avoid food at Dalit's house? Youth lodges police complaint
A Dalit youth has lodged a complaint with the police against BS Yeddyurappa in which he has alleged that the food consumed by Karnataka BJP president BS Yedyurappa and other BJP leaders was not prepared by the Dalit family but was ordered from a hotel.
Karnataka BJP president BS Yedyurappa has landed in a soup after eating breakfast in the house of a Dalit family in Kelakote area of Chitradurga district on May 19.
A Dalit youth has lodged a complaint with the police against BS Yeddyurappa. In his complaint, Venkatesh D alleged that the food consumed by the former chief minister and other BJP leaders was not prepared by the Dalit family but was ordered from a hotel.
Venkatesh D accused BS Yeddyurappa of practising untouchability which is punishable under law. He alleged that BS Yeddyurappa's act would convey a wrong message to the society. The police are investigating the incident, reports said.
In his response to the allegations, BS Yeddyurappa sought to turn the tables on JD(S) and the ruling Congress. He accused the two parties of disrespecting the Dalits by raising the issue. "All the leaders who raised the issue must apologise to Dalits at whose homes I had breakfast," he said.
BS Yeddyurappa further said, "The reason for having breakfast at a Dalit's home was to send out a message that BJP and I are for a socially equitable society. But what can I say when people are criticising me for having breakfast bought from outside?"
BS Yedyurappa is not the only leader to have eaten a meal at a Dalit's home and courted controversy or hogged limelight. There have been several such incidents in the past. However, the one thing common in them is that all the politicians remember the Dalits and eat at their houses just before elections. They forget them after the polls.
RAHUL GANDHI
Dining with the Dalits came under spotlight for the first the time after Mayawati, a Dalit herself, was the Uttar Pradesh chief minister and Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi was attempting to poach her Scheduled Caste (SC) votebank. He would visit Dalit families, have meals with them and even spend a night at their place - be it the house of Chedi Pasi in Barabanki district in September 2009 or of Kunjilal in Jhansi district in October 2011.
While Mayawati fumed at Rahul's adventures, the BJP mocked him saying it did not believe in publicising visits of its leaders to the houses of Dalit families.
In a dig at Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, the then Uttar Pradesh chief minister had claimed that "one political leader" used to eat at the homes of Dalits, but always carried with him a "Bisleri bottle".
Rahul Gandhi perhaps would get the credit for eating meals in the houses of Dalits the maximum number of times.
In September 2016, Rahul Gandhi took lunch at a Dalit's house in Baragaon village in UP's Mau's district during his Kisan Yatra. Congress general secretary in charge of UP Ghulam Nabi Azad accompanied him.
Rukmina Devi and her husband Swaminath Ram, who had hosted Rahul Gandhi and Ghulam Nabi Azad, borrowed flour, vegetables and other materials because they were too poor to have afforded it.
AMIT SHAH
Even though the BJP would criticise Rahul Gandhi for his momentary display of love for the Dalits, the ruling party itself indulges in the same tactics. With an eye on the recently-held UP and Punjab Assembly elections, BJP president Amit Shah on May 30 had a meal with Girjaprasad Bind and Ikbal Bind's family, who belong to the Dalit community, in Jogiyapur village in Sevapuri Assembly segment. Jogiyapur falls under Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Lok Sabha constituency of Varanasi.
Earlier, on May 11, the BJP president had also taken a holy dip along with saints, retired bureaucrats and police officials, mostly from the Dalit community, as part of "Samrasta Snan (a holy bath for social harmony)" at Valmiki ghat of Kshipra river during Simhastha in Ujjain.
Slamming Amit Shah for eating meal at a Dalit's house in Varanasi, the then Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav had called it a "drama" and said that the Samajwadi Party leaders did not indulge in such acts.
On her part, Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati too criticised Shah, terming his action a "nautanki".
JYOTIRADITYA SCINDIA
Congress MP and former Union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia too ate meal in a Dalit's house in his home state Madhya Pradesh. However, he did not court any controversy.
In April, while campaigning for the Ater bye-elections in the state, Scindia entered the house of a Dalit family. He sought to help the woman who was rolling chapattis. Scindia got down to making chapattis on the earthen 'chulha'. He also ate in the Dalit's house.
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