In bid to win Lingayat support, Gandhi visits Murugha Mutt

The visit is significant in the run-up to the 2023 Assembly elections as Congress is trying to win the support of the Lingayat community.
Murugha Mutt pontiff Shivamurthy Murugha Sharanaru presents Rahul Gandhi with the coffee table book ‘The Social Reformer’, brought out by The New Indian Express, at the mutt. (Photo| EPS
Murugha Mutt pontiff Shivamurthy Murugha Sharanaru presents Rahul Gandhi with the coffee table book ‘The Social Reformer’, brought out by The New Indian Express, at the mutt. (Photo| EPS

CHITRADURGA: Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi paid a visit to Sri Murugha Mutt here on Wednesday, in an apparent bid to regain the confidence of the Lingayat community which has been backing BJP for several years. Gandhi was also given a ‘Linga Deekshe’ by pontiff Shivamurthy Murugha Sharanaru on the occasion. Gandhi, who was on his way to take part in the 75th birthday celebration of former chief minister and leader of opposition Siddaramaiah in Davanagere, made a stopover and spent nearly 45 minutes at the mutt.

The visit is significant in the run-up to the 2023 Assembly elections as Congress is trying to win the support of the Lingayat community that distanced itself from Congress after then Prime Minister and Rahul’s father Rajiv Gandhi unceremoniously removed Lingayat leader Veerendra Patil as chief minister in 1990.

With BJP too seeming to have antagonised the community by removing the Lingayat strongman BS Yediyurappa and replacing him with another Lingayat Basavaraj Bommai, the opposition party is trying to win the numerically and politically strong Lingayats. After giving the Deekshe, Shivamurthy Murugha Sharanaru told Rahul that he is now a Basava devotee. Rahul was also gifted a coffee table book ‘The Social Reformer’ on Sharanaru, brought out by The New Indian Express.

Hubballi Hosamutt seer Chandrashekhar Swami told Rahul that since his grandmother and father were prime ministers, he too would be a Prime Minister one day as he has been given the Linga Deekshe. Sharanaru interrupted and told the seer that the mutt is not the platform to say such things. “The mutt treats everyone equally, cutting across party lines. It is the people who will decide,” he said. KPCC president DK Shivakumar, who was accompanying Rahul, said Congress has not hurt any mutt and that is the ideology of the party.

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