A senior Bharatiya Janata Party lawmaker from Karnataka has stirred controversy by saying that he would have ordered the police to shoot intellectuals, had he been the Union Home Minister.
Speaking at a Kargil Vijay Diwas event in Vijayapura, Basanagouda Patil Yatnal branded liberals and intellectuals as “anti-nationals”.
“These people (intellectuals) live in this country and use all the facilities for which we pay tax. Then they raise slogans against the Indian Army. Our country faces grave danger from intellectuals and seculars than anyone else,” said Mr Yatnal.
Both Congress and the Janata Dal (Secular) have demanded that action be taken against Yatnal, reported a news source. “This is a reflection of the BJP’s mindset,” Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee President Dinesh Gundu Rao told a news daily. “This is actually what they believe in and what they think that to achieve their goals any amount of deaths and violence is a given and they will use any method to propagate their ideology.”
The lawmaker had earlier courted a controversy when he told a local party municipal members to not help Muslims.
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