Water Resources Minister M.B. Patil, who is one of the vociferous voices of the agitation demanding separate religion status for the Lingayat community, said Chief Minister Siddaramaiah will be persuaded to make a recommendation to the Centre on this demand before February.
Mr. Patil spoke to The Hindu ahead of a Lingayat convention planned in Hubballi on Sunday, followed by similar ones in Bengaluru and other cities.
Excerpts from the interview:
Why was the decision on forming an expert committee on Lingayat religion shelved?
We decided it would be a time-consuming exercise and we may not be able to submit the proposal to the Union government before elections, if we delayed it further. We want the proposal to be submitted before February, as many legal formalities need to be completed, with various sects giving different proposals. While one sect wants Lingayat religion, another wants Veerashaiva-Lingayat religion, while Panchapeetha wants only ‘2A’ status. We have now decided to let the government make a final call, based on merit, before December or January, and submit the recommendation before February.
What’s the next move if your demand is not met by the Centre?
We have several options before us, including filing petition before the Supreme Court
Several leaders of Hindutva group and BJP say you are dividing society.
If seeking separate religion tag divides society, then why did such a thing not happen when Buddhism and Jainism were identified as separate religions? When nothing of that sort happened, how will separate religion tag for Lingayat divide society or harm Hindu religion?
It is also alleged that you are using this issue to emerge as a strong Lingayat leader to counter BJP State president B.S. Yeddyurappa, who is considered the ‘undisputed leader’.
This allegation is baseless. We have made Basavaraj Horatti, JD(S) MLC, our leader. I am just an ordinary member and not seeking any post.
With Congress leaders such as Shamanur Shivashankarappa and Eshwar B. Khandre opposing it, will it not affect the election prospects?
It will not make any impact on our elections at all as it has nothing to do with it. All we are saying is that if those leaders want Veerashaiva as separate religion, let them demand it, and there is no need to force us to be involved with it.
What is the biggest bone of contention in the debate now?
The conflict is now only over names ‘Veerashaiva’ and ‘Lingayat’. Veerashaiva is only one of the 93 sects of Lingayat, so the name of the religion cannot be Veerashaiva-Lingayat, it should be only Lingayat. It was only around 2004 that the word ‘Veerashaiva’ was introduced by some people saying it was a more ‘cultured’ word.