Soon after, while addressing the aspirants at the fair, the Minister for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship said, "We are determined to help you. We will be with you, no matter what. We will do anything for the survival of our people. We cannot be bogged down by some street dogs staging protests."
While it's not clear whether the minister, known for making controversial statements, if he targeted any specific group, the Congress condemned his remark and said the BJP needs to make their stand clear and put it in their manifesto.
Congress spokesperson Tom Vadakkan told NDTV, "This is something Dalits have been fighting for years. This man has no business being in cabinet. If he is the new icon of the BJP in Karnataka, God bless them."
Mr Hegde, however, said that his comment was being misinterpreted. "It's totally misinterpreted. Congress is trying to damage my image. I made the statement with regard to those who have been criticising my stand," he told NDTV.
Actor Prakash Raj, 53, one of the sharpest and most vocal critics of the opposition BJP in Karnataka, has also accused the minister, on Twitter, of likening Dalits to dogs.
Enough is enough...Serial offender...minister Ananthkumar Hegde at it again....he calls Dalits DOGs ..for protesting against his controversial constitution remark... supreme leaders of #bjp will you ask him to step down ...or do you endorse his abuse #justasking
- Prakash Raj (@prakashraaj) January 20, 2018
Mr Raj had written an open letter to the minister last month after the minister had asked people to "claim with pride that they are Muslim, Christian, Lingayat, Brahmin, or a Hindu" during an event in Karnataka.
The minister had said that his party, the ruling BJP, will "soon change the Constitution," which mentions the word "secular". "Those who, without knowing about their parental blood, call themselves secular, they don't have their own identity...They don't know about their parentage, but they are intellectuals," he added.
In his letter, the actor had explained to the 49-year-old minister that secularism is about "respecting and accepting diverse religions".
While speaking to NDTV, Mr Raj had said, "Look at his language, his thought process. What's his agenda? He says we have come to change the constitution. Who are 'we'? I would like to ask our beloved prime minister if he is okay with what this man is saying or if it is this man's individual thought process."
Even though the BJP clarified "it wasn't on the same page with Hedge", Mr Raj questioned the absence of any action against the minister.
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The Congress had asked for his resignation and said if a person doesn't believe in the Constitution, "he has no right" to be a member of parliament.
A group of activists had blocked his vehicle and raised slogans criticising his Constitution remark.
Soon after he was appointed a minister, CCTV footage of Mr Hegde slapping a doctor was widely circulated. He was seen hitting the doctor, grabbing him by the throat and pinning him against a wall. The minister was apparently furious over the way his mother, who had suffered multiple fractures after a fall, was being treated by doctors.
