Mysuru: “Caste based society was  strictly condemned by Basavanna, but now we have a caste based census”, said MLA Ashok Kheny.

He was speaking in the occasion of ‘Basava Jayanthi – 2015′ and ‘Basava National Award-2014’ jointly organised by District Administration and Kannada and Culture Department, at Kalamandira on Tuesday.

He said, “in the name of caste, no one should not separate people is what Basavanna guided but the Government itself has come out  with a caste census. People should come out strongly against this caste based census because it is against Basavanna’s principles”.

“Caste based census will create lot of problems among people. For instance people will give wrong information in the census about income, assets, caste etc hoping to get benefits or prevent them being taken away.  As per census lists there wont be any poor people at all in the government records and this is more dangerous. A request has even been given to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah not to conduct the survey but he was unresponsive”, he said.

“Basavanna and Dr B R Ambedkar were always against inequality but people failed to bring Ambedkar to the Verashaiva Community because Verashaiva community lacked groupism. 71% people from Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes were from the place where Basavanna was born. Everyone should live according to the principles  of Basavanna and work should be entertained more than keeping quiet”, he added.

Professor of Kuvempu Kannada Study Centre, Dr Nilagiri M Talvar, Lecturer of JSS Women’s College Dr Nandeesh Hanche, President of Basava Balaga Okuta Muguru Nanjunda Swamy and others were present.