Demands now to forbid Muslim drivers during temple pilgrimages in Karnataka

Bengaluru: The list of demands and campaigns for bans on religious affairs at temples keeps expanding every day in Karnataka.

Some Hindu organizations have now started another campaign asking Hindus not to engage Muslim drivers and Muslim-owned transport companies when they go for temple tours and pilgrimages, an IANS report said.

According to the report, Prashanth Bangera of Bharatha Rakshana Vedike on Friday made an appeal to Hindus not to take Muslim drivers with them when they go for temple trips and pilgrimages. He had also given out a call not to use vehicles owned by Muslim transport companies. He urged that all Hindu organizations should support his call and bring awareness among the people in this regard.

Sri Ram Sena lent its support to this call, the report added.

Meanwhile, Pramod Muthalik, founder of Sri Ram Sena has urged that the Muzrai department should issue notice to the Muslim merchants and vendors in famous Savadatti Yallamma pilgrimage center in the Belagavi district of north Karnataka.

He maintained that if the shops were not vacated, Sri Ram Sena activists would meet Muzrai Minister Shashikala Jolle and demand to vacate them.

Pramod Muthalik had met the Deputy Speaker and BJP MLA Anand Mamani earlier and urged that non-Hindu merchants should be vacated from the premises of the Savadatti Yellamma pilgrimage center. He stated that lakhs of pilgrims visited the temple and there are more than 50 percent of Muslim merchants carrying out their business here, he had claimed.

(With inputs from IANS)