Three murders in a communal cauldron

With tempers running high among Hindutva activists in Karnataka after killings and counter-killings in Dakshina Kannada, K.V. Aditya Bharadwaj and Raghava M. report on how the government’s handling of the investigations could further nourish the ecosystem of violence in the State’s coastal belt

On July 27, as his car drove into Nettaru, a remote hamlet in Dakshina Kannada district of Karnataka, Nalin Kumar Kateel, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) State chief, met with a hostile reception. Workers of his party and Sangh Parivar outfits surrounded and pushed his car, raising anti-government slogans.

It took Kateel, the area MP, nearly an hour to pacify the angry crowd after consoling the family members of Praveen Nettaru, 34, his one-time driver and a budding worker of the party’s Yuva Morcha, who was hacked to death by a gang of assailants a day earlier. “What is the use of BJP being in power in both the State and the Centre if they cannot safeguard their own workers?” Praveen’s mother Ratnavati told The Hindu.

Coming close on the heels of another BJP worker, Harsha, 28, being hacked to death in Shivamogga on February 20 this year, the murder of Praveen Nettaru seems to have unleashed a wave of anger and frustration among the Hindutva cadre base across the State. The two murders also come amid a virulent communal campaign against the Muslim community by Hindutva forces in the State – starting from hijab, which eventually expanded to halal meat, azaan, and an economic boycott of Muslims.

Police sources say Praveen was killed to avenge the murder of Mohammed Masood, 19, in Kalanja, allegedly killed by Hindutva activists. The July 26 killing was closely followed by the murder of Mohammed Fazil, 23, in Surathkal, reportedly to avenge Praveen’s death – three murders in 10 days in Dakshina Kannada district, pushing the police into a defensive mode.

Fearing a communal riot or more retaliatory killings, they not only imposed prohibitory orders but also a night curfew, forcing all shops to shut at 6 p.m. They also banned pillion riders on two-wheelers, a measure that drew the ire of the public and was soon withdrawn. The night curfew was in force for over 10 days, exposing the fragile law and order scenario in the coastal region. The political opposition has come down heavily on the government, terming it a “breakdown of law and order”.

There has been rebellion in units of the BJP, with over 100 local office-bearers resigning, even as Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad activists barged into the residence of Home Minister Araga Jnanendra complaining of inaction against “jihadis”. Even Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai was gheraoed and BJP workers openly called for a “Yogi Adityanath model of leadership” for the State, pushing him to say he would also implement the “U.P. model”, while several leaders called for “encounters of jihadis”, implementation of “bulldozer justice”, and a ban on Islamist outfit Popular Front of India (PFI) and its affiliates. Sources said the heat of the unrest among the Sangh Parivar cadre was so intense that Union Home Minister Amit Shah flew down to Bengaluru for an official event and held talks on the sidelines with various factions to pacify them.

Hours before he was killed, Praveen had got a cost estimation done for installing CCTV cameras at the chicken shop on the outskirts of Bellare town he had opened in October 2021. “He had felt unidentified people had been moving around him,” said Dinesh Chandra B. Hegde, Praveen’s friend and a member of Bellare gram panchayat from the BJP.