Lingayat issue: Siddaramaiah puts BJP in a Catch-22 position

The Congress-led Karnataka Government under Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has successfully killed two birds with one stone by its decision to grant minority status to the Lingayat community in Karnataka.

With yesterday’s decision, Siddaramaiah has been able to strengthen Congress’ vote base among the 85 lakh-strong Lingayat community, who were perceived to be a strong vote base for BJP, under the leadership of former CM BS Yeddyurappa, who is also a Lingayat. Congress has given the option to Veerashaivas, who claim that that Lingayats and Veerashaivas are the same, to be a part of the Lingayat community. All this while shifting the responsibility of taking minority status forward onto the BJP-led Union Government.

It may be recalled that the followers of Basavanna, the great social reformer of the 12th century in Karnataka, had led a religious reform movement to remove caste system, religious rituals and to empower women. They rejected the phallic linga symbol of Shiva and opted for ishta linga.

This social reformation movement witnessed such strong acceptance that people from various backward and downtrodden caste and communities accepted the vachanas preached by Basavanna and started wearing ishta lingas  or atma lingas to be treated with respect and dignity, especially in Central Karnataka, Hyderabad Karnataka and Mumbai Karnataka, where casteism was very predominant and suppression of downtrodden castes was high, similar to that of the followers of Buddha and Mahaveera.

The Veerashaivas, on the other hand, are the followers of the five peethas and are worshippers of Shiva. They followed Hindu rituals before Basavanna began the reformation movement.

The demand for minority status by the Lingayat community has been a long pending one, and the State Government had set up a committee under Justice Nagmohan Das to study the issue and offer recommendations.

The State Cabinet had met three times last week to discuss this long-standing issue as there were a lot of differences among the Veerashaiva members and Lingayat members of the Cabinet regarding the acceptance of the Das Committee recommendations and the State Minority Commission Report for inclusion of Lingayat community.

Speaking to the media after the Cabinet meeting, Law Minister Jayachandra said that the Cabinet had decided to grant the recognition of religious minority to Lingayat and Veerashaiva Lingayats under section 2(d) of the Karnataka State Minorities Act, and the same was being forwarded to the Centre for Notification under Section 2 (c) of National Commission for Minorities.

This decision of the Congress-led Government has taken the steam out of the BJP in Karnataka, which was hoping to consolidate the Veerashaiva and Lingayat vote bank in Central and Northern Karnataka by projecting Yeddyurappa as its chief ministerial candidate.

The BJP has also lost an opportunity by not associating itself with the Lingayat community in exerting pressure on the state government in granting this minority status. Instead, by choosing to accuse the Congress Government of splitting the Hindu religion, BJP is now in a Catch-22 situation.

If the Union Government does not accept the state government recommendation, the Congress state government would put the blame on BJP for not granting this status. If the Union Government accepts the recommendation, the Congress-led state government would claim the credit which it would surely try to encash in not only the upcoming assembly polls, but also the next Parliamentary elections.