BENGALURU: Bangalore Club has suspended a long-time woman member for belittling Kannada. The incident took place in the Cards Club on the first floor in early January. The elderly woman allegedly abused a service staffer for speaking in Kannada.
“How dare you speak in Kannada? This is the language spoken in slums,” was her stinging remark to the staffer. The altercation took place in the presence of members playing cards at tables nearby.
The 72-year-old woman is a permanent member.
Soon after the incident, the management committee received a complaint against her. A general body meeting on January 16 initiated an inquiry and suspended her for a month from January 20.
A notice to this effect, signed by Col (Retd) HPM Soans, secretary, is on display at the club.
A senior management committee member confirmed the suspension. Without elaborating, he said, “Such informal exchanges take place in every club, everywhere.” He defended the woman, saying she tended to be unmindful of what she was speaking. “She is elderly and most of the time is not aware about what she speaks,” he said.
She has spoken inappropriately and faced disciplinary action on earlier occasions too, he explained.
When Express contacted the suspended member, she denied such an incident ever took place. “Absolutely not. I can swear on anything,” she said.
However, she admitted she had been involved in an incident with a fellow member during a card game earlier. She was playing with a Punjabi and a South Indian. “The South Indian lady always spoke in a language (Kannada) the Punjabi could not understand, and that was really irritating,” she said. She said all she had remarked was, “If you can talk in Hindi or English, we could all enjoy your jokes.”
The woman said she suffered from diabetes and was not keeping well for some time.
The club was in the news recently after IPS officer R P Sharma and his car driver were involved in a run-in with a security guard.
The club had suspended Sharma’s membership for a month, and soon faced an excise raid and hostile inspections from other government departments.