BELAGAVI: More than 300-year-old Lingayat mutt in Belagavi district’s Hukkeri taluk celebrated the nation’s syncretic ethos by inviting a Muslim leader to declare the 10-day Dasara festivities open on Saturday.
Mukthar Pathan, chief of Karnataka Minority Development Corporation, inaugurated the festivities at Gurushanteshwara Samsthan Hiremath Mutt, wearing a skullcap and lighting a lamp at the mutt’s programme hall.
State minority development corporation chairman Mukthar Pathan launched Dasara festivities at Gurushanteshwara Samsthan Hiremath Mutt in Hukkeri town, about 560km from Bengaluru.
It’s for the first time that the mutt invited a non-Hindu to open Dasara at its premises. Pathan, who accepted the invitation extended by mutt pontiff Chandrasekhar Mahaswami, said he is blessed to launch Dasara in Hukkeri and added, “This time, Dasara is a low-key event, and both Hindus and Muslims will pray to the goddess to end the scourge of novel coronavirus.”
The mutt’s gesture is in contrast to the recent controversy over a jewellery ad that sought to promote communal harmony and it was later taken down amid online backlash.
For decades, the standalone Hukkeri mutt, like many other institutions in North Karnataka, has been promoting communal harmony and thousands of Muslims visit it.