BENGALURU: Former Congress MLA from Pulakeshinagar R Akhanda Srinivas Murthy wants to avenge his insult by top Congress leaders, AICC President Mallikarjun Kharge and KPCC President DK Shivakumar, by winning the constituency on a Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) ticket.
He decided to contest on the BSP ticket from the reserved constituency after Congress denied him the ticket on the grounds that the dominant minority community was allegedly upset with him after the August 2020 DJ Halli riots. Pulakeshinagar constituency has a voter population of 2,36,000, of which around 85,000 are Muslims, around 65,000 are SC/STs, followed by others.
Large-scale violence had broken out in DJ Halli and adjoining areas in East Bengaluru on August 11, 2020, following a blasphemous post by Akhanda’s nephew on social media, in which a mob of around 3,000 had vandalised DJ Halli police station, public and private property and torched Akhanda’s house.
“The arsonists were not from my constituency. They were brought from outside by my rivals in the Congress party. They were jailed too. Instead of coming out in my support, some leaders in Congress cheated and insulted me. We will teach them a lesson. The people of my constituency are with me. I will win, 100 per cent,” Akhanda told TNIE amid thunderous sloganeering of ‘Anna jeetega (Brother will win)!’ by hundreds of people surrounding him in his house in Kavalbyrasandra, which falls in Pulakeshinagar constituency.
“I will provide good schools, health facilities and good roads to my people,” said the sitting MLA for the past 10 years. The nearly 1.5-km long Tannery Road stretch from BR Ambedkar Medical College & Hospital to a little past DJ Halli police station is littered with garbage and the stench gets unbearable near Bengaluru’s only chamda mandi (tannery).
Considered one of the tallest young Dalit leaders in the state, Akhanda had won the last assembly election against Prasanna Kumar of JDS by the highest margin of 81,626 votes. He had earlier resigned as Congress MLA after his name didn’t figure in the third list of the party, and decided to contest as an Independent.
“The BSP approached me and since it is a national party consisting largely of Dalits and minorities, I decided to join it on the advice of my constituency people,” said the MLA. The Congress has fielded AC Srinivas, the BJP candidate is Murali, Anuradha is contesting from JDS and Suresh Rathod from Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
“We will vote for Anna and make him win. We don’t see the party. We see Anna. He is not an MLA but our brother. His doors are always open for the poor,” shouted Mehmood Sharief from the swelling crowd. “Anna has done a lot of work, which has earned him some enemies in the Congress party. They had called outsiders to trigger violence. The DJ Halli riots were planned to give him a bad name,” said Syed Asif Baba of BSP.
“He helped around 500 people in the constituency get haqpatras (title deed). Yeh MLA idhar se nahi hatega (this MLA will not move from here),” vouched Taha Khan from Shampura. Lakshmi and Fauzia Begum spoke about how Akhanda had reached out to his people with ration kits, oxygen beds and vaccines during the Covid-19 pandemic.
The assembly constituency includes Kavalbyrasandra, SK Garden, DJ Halli, Munishwarnagar, Kushalnagar, Sagayapura and Pulakeshinagar wards. It is known to be a highly sensitive constituency with poor socio-economic indicators.