Activists demand CM give relief to minorities, end caste bias

Maqsood Maniyar | NT

Bengaluru: Civil society organisation Bahutva Karnataka (BK) has shot off a list of demands to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah that it would like the newly sworn in Congress government in the state to meet.

Noting that there had been an “unusual” scale of participation on part of the civil society in the recently concluded Assembly elections, BK concluded that there should be continued engagement of people’s movements with the new government so as to make Karnataka into “Sarva Janangada Shantiya Tota” (a garden of peace for all people) as per the ideals of prominent Kannada poet Kuvempu.

The group acknowledged that more than 60 per cent of the electorate had voted against the BJP government for its policies and demanded that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah heed the democratic will of the people of the state and ring in the changes on key issues.

BK’s document included a wide variety of issues such as worker’s rights, women’s empowerment, relief for minorities, caste discrimination, and education reforms, among others. They also noted that many of these demands coincided with the promises made in the Congress party’s manifesto. The BK's open letter addressed the plight of women workers, including Dalit women.

“Abolish the contract system in solid waste management, regularise and make permanent the Pourakarmikas (as promised), and immediately address the long pending grievances of women-led work-forces, like ASHA and Anganwadi workers, garment workers, domestic workers, National Health Mission workers, and Mid-day meal workers,” it said.

“Ensure that eggs are provided every day to all children on all days of the week in all government schools, as well as to adolescent girls. Provide an additional glass of milk or curd to children who do not eat eggs. Restart the Ksheera Bhagya scheme. Cancel contracts with centralised kitchens, especially those with ideological agendas that refuse to provide eggs or use onion and garlic,” the organisation added. The group also called for revocation of laws such as the anti-conversion act, prevention of cow slaughter act, besides policies such as the ban on the hijab in educational institutions.

They also demanded that Minimum Support Price (MSP) be granted to farmers and that caste discrimination be ended in the top educational institutions like Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) and Indian Institute of Management (IIM).