A complaint was lodged at Teradal (Bagalkot, Karnataka) police station on 12th Feb 1999 against Pramod Muthalik and 20 others for “unlawful assembly” and “creating trouble to the police and the public”. Another complaint was filed in the same police station (PS) on 12th July 1999 against Mr. Muthalik and 32 others for “unlawful assembly” and “violating prohibitory orders”. On 10 Oct 2000 Mr. Muthalik and 27 others were charged with burning Samyukta Karnataka newspaper copies in public at Aigali PS (Belgaum, Karnataka). On 15th Sep 2001 a complaint was lodged at the Hubli New Town PS (Hubli, Karnataka) against Mr. Muthalik and 55 others for “assembly at Idgah Maidan with lethal weapons”, “pelting stones”, “damaging property”, “using filthy language against a community” and “obstructing the police to do their duty”. On 21st Dec 2001 a report was filed at Madakere PS (Coorg, Karnataka) against Pramod Muthalik for making a “provocation speech”. On 6th Feb 2002 Mr. Muthalik was charged with “creating trouble between Hindus and Muslims by provoked shouting and creating L&O problem” in Bilagi PS (Bagalkot, Karnataka). On 18th Dec 2002 he is again charged for making “provocation speech” in a complaint lodged at Chikmagalur Town PS (Chikmagalur, Karnataka). Some other complaints against Mr. Muthalik:
- 1st Mar 2003 – Hubli Rural PS (Dharwad, Karnataka) – “Provocation speech in a public meeting”
- 11th Aug 2003 – Javavgi PS (Gulbarga, Karnataka) - ”Provocation speech in a public meeting”
- 26th Sep 2004 – Vidhyatanapura PS (Bangalore, Karnataka) - ”Provocation speech in a public function”
So on and so forth.
These are just few of the 41 odd police complaints against Pramod Muthalik in Karnataka going back to 1999. Most of these relate to “provocation speech” or in other words “spewing hate and abuse against Muslims”. Unfortunately it took a public assault of women in the heart of city of Mangalore for the media and administration to recognize the menace posed by Mr. Muthalik and his gang of hooligans. However Mr. Muthalik has been spewing venom towards the the Muslim community for more than a decade under successive governments in Karnataka including Congress, JD (S) and BJP. His cronies even tried bombing a magistrate court in Hubli but unluckily for him, even that was blamed on SIMI and Islamist terrorists. Was it anger at not getting recognition as a hard-line Hindutva leader that explains Mr. Muthalik’s modus operandi lately?
After the Mangalore pub attack, Mr. Muthalik did try to bring his favorite punching bag, Indian Muslims, in play as the women were not only drinking but also allegedly mingling with Muslim boys. But even before the pub incident, Sri Ram Sene (Sena), disrupted a fashion show in Mangalore on 20th Dec 2008 as “Muslim boys were enjoying vulgar displays of Hindu girls”. Then on 26th Dec they stopped a bus carrying coaching students and beat them up for traveling in a mixed group of Hindus and Muslims.
It is difficult not to see what Mr. Muthalik is trying to do here: divide the society on religious lines with one community as transgressor and the other as victim, and then feed upon the sense of victimhood of his favorite community. It is wrong to assume that Mr. Muthalik chanced upon this “golden goose” only recently. He was the state convenor for Bajrang Dal and then the state president for Shiv Sena before forming his own Sri Ram Sene as the other organizations were too soft for his liking! It is also incorrect to say that he is a nobody as Rajiv Pratap Rudy argues in an interview. While Mr. Muthalik is no popular public leader, his ability to whip up communal sentiments and gather thousands for his “Hindu causes” is well established.
Perhaps Mr. Muthalik was just too frustrated to see his fellow Hindutva hooligan Pravin Togadia rise through the ranks or his ideological twin across the border Raj Thackeray hogging all the limelight. Perhaps he was just enamored of Uma Bharati who could lead a rampaging Hindu mob to tear down a medieval mosque and go on to become the chief minister of Madhya Pradesh. Or Narendra Modi who not only failed to protect 58 Indians in Godhra but over a thousand throughout Gujarat later, and still went on to be elected chief minister. Twice. Perhaps Mr. Muthalik has been following the career of Babu Bajrangi closely who is free and outside prison even after accepting his role in killing of scores of Muslims. Perhaps this is just a beginning for Mr. Muthalik.
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
I have been watching these smaller hindutva outfits for some time now and their activities and venom they are spilling are many steps ahead of RSS. I have a feeling that the movement that RSS led over all these years is now out of their hands and now many smaller outfits who are more extremist than their parent organizations are running their own agenda and have network to finance and arrange workers to execute their evil designs on India.
These are not extremist groups – these are hoodlums and anti-social elements surviving on the corruption, indifference and impotence of the criminal systems.
Remember the dialogue of Amitabh from Hum “gandi naali ka keeda”.
Those who think that Talibanisation is only Islamic should understand that their opposition to anything Muslim or Islamic being ‘extremist’ is not exclusive to anything Muslim. The criminality of RSS as condoned in the murder of MK Gandhi, claimed to be the father of nation by India must be ashamed of not baning the outfit then and not later. Pakistan is a smaller country and there are chances that a militant India might bring a leader on that scence to unite it against India but the converse is not true. Muslims are not a small group to be viped the Palestine way nor is India homogeneous linguistically or regionally. The Balkanisation of India is the most worrysome aspect of tolerating these goons in the garb of containing ‘terrorism’ and retaining ‘nationalism’.
It is a clever tactic used by RSS and Sangh Parivar to induldge in terrorism and save their skin from draconian anti-terror laws.I think organisations like sree ram sena,abhinav bharat, hindu jan jagaran samiti, sanatan sanstha etc whose memebers are involved in Malegaon,Thane ,New Bombay ,Panvel, Nanded,Poorna ,Jalna ,Parbhani bomb blasts are part and parcel of Sangh Parivar.Just to save RSS,VHP,BD and others who have so much of assets running into hundreds and thuosands of crores in India and abroad and to save their Hindutva -Vadi infrastructure being destroyed by anti terror laws if declared TERRORIST ORGANISATIONS , they are playing the drama like some persons resigning from their ranks and forming terrorists out-fit.Sadhvi Prigya Singh Thakur and Pramod Mutallik are test cases to this effects.Therefore ,there is need to uncover hidden connection between Sangh Parivar and splinter hindutvadi terrorist groups which are around 150 in numbers and active in variuos parts of the country
The Hindutva terrorists are a big threat to the nation. The government has to act very swiftly against them, else major damage will be done to the country.
It is unfortunate that the probes are not going beyond Malegaon and on to Hyderabad (Mecca Masjid), Ajmer and Samjhauta Express blasts. If this happens, it will genuinely uncover a can of worms.
Not just ramsena,bajrang dal,but any form of extreme and radical and anti-social groups should be banned,whatever relegion they are from…..because these extremist groups are the real threat to the secularism of any country.These groups implant hatred in peoples mind,and afterward they channelize this hatred for there own benefit……………….