Since the formation of the new Afghanistan government, ‘Taliban’ seems to be the buzzword in the world. Here in Karnataka, politicians have engaged in verbal duels by calling each other ‘Taliban’. The spat began after former chief minister and the leader of the opposition, Siddaramaiah, equated the BJP and RSS to the Taliban. State BJP president Nalin Kumar Kateel hit back at him by calling him a “terrorist”.
An incident in which a few BJP workers allegedly stopped a vehicle ferrying Muslim and Christian youngsters near Mangalore has now snowballed into a huge controversy in the state. Siddaramaiah had condemned the incident and said, “Stopping the vehicles and harassing young people on mere suspicion shows BJP’s Taliban mindset. The RSS is an extra-constitutional authority. It is a dangerous organisation.”
Meanwhile, Kateel called Siddaramaiah a Talibani who is against Hindus. He alleged the maximum number of murders took place in the state during the Congress regime. “The Siddaramaiah government was against Hindus. Several Hindus were murdered during his regime. He did nothing to stop them. Who is a Talibani? Him or us?” Kateel, the BJP MP from Mangalore, said.
Endorsing Kateel’s views, BJP national general secretary and MLA CT Ravi took a swipe at Siddaramaiah and invited him to join the RSS to understand it better. “Siddaramaiah is calling us Talibanis. He does not know anything about us. He won’t be able to understand the RSS from outside. I invite him to join us,” Ravi said.
The former chief minister, Siddaramaiah, has lashed out at Ravi calling him a “fake Hindu”. In a series of tweets, he has questioned the RSS-BJP’s commitment towards Hindus. “Who is RSS to claim that they protect the Hindus? Are they elected by the people? Do they have any constitutional sanctity? Protesting farmers in Delhi to a raped Dalit girl UP are also Hindus. What is RSS doing about them? We will defeat your Talibani mindset through constitutional methods,” Siddaramaiah said.
Several BJP and Congress leaders have also started calling each other Taliban after the verbal spat between Siddaramaiah and Kateel.
However, chief minister Basavaraj Bommai and his predecessor BS Yediyurappa have distanced themselves from the ongoing tussle.
On the standard of political discourse these days, a senior Congress leader from Karnataka quipped, “I know these people don’t know what Taliban is or what it stands for. I advise the state government to send a delegation of MLAs and MLCs to Afghanistan to study and understand Taliban. I hope, once they are back, they will not use the words like Taliban so loosely or carelessly.”
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