Karnataka CM’s `statement’ raised in Maharashtra Assembly

Bengaluru: A Congress MLA on Friday said the Maharashtra government should take seriously a reported remark by Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai that 40 villages from Jat tehsil were welcome to join the southern state.

Vikramsinh Sawant, MLA from Jat in the border district of Sangli, was speaking in the Maharashtra Assembly.

Bommai made the comment in the Karnataka Assembly earlier this week, he claimed.

”Bommai said Karnataka will not cede even an inch of Belgaum (Belagavi) and if the 40 gram panchayats in Jat tehsil pass a resolution that they wish to be part of Karnataka, they will be incorporated,” the MLA said.

The remark should be taken seriously, Sawant said.

NCP leader Chhagan Bhujbal, who is coordination minister for the Marathi-dominated border areas in Karnataka, said what Bommai said would never happen.

Sawant said these 40 villages had launched an agitation in 2011-12, threatening to join Karnataka if they did not get basic amenities including drinking water. But the gram panchayats had not passed any resolution, the MLA said.

NCP MLA Rohit Pawar said a delegation from Belagavi told him that several youths were picked up from their homes and detained by the Karnataka police recently.

The Maharashtra government should look into the issue, he demanded.

Maharashtra and Karnataka are locked in a border dispute for several decades and the matter is pending before the Supreme Court.

Maharashtra stakes claim to Belagavi, Karwar and surrounding areas which have a sizable Marathi-speaking population and are part of the southern state.

Recently, Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and other leaders from the ruling alliance had condemned alleged desecration of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj’s statue in Bengaluru.