Many MPs stayed away from the Kisan Samsath, at the Krishi Yantra Mela, organised by CAMPCO at Puttur on Saturday. Nalin Kumar Kateel, Ananth Kumar Hegde (Uttara Kannada), Karunakaran P. (Kasaragod), Mudda Hanumegowda (Tumakuru), Prathapsimha (Mysuru) and Chandrappa (Chitradurga) were the ones missing.
Only B.S. Yeddyurappa (Shimoga) and Shoba Karandlaje (Udupi-Chikkamagaluru) had to take the questions from the farmers. At the inaugural session, Konkodi Padmanabha, president, CAMPCO, said that Mr. Kateel had to persuade H.N. Ananth Kumar, Union Minister for Chemicals and Fertilizers, who was in Mangaluru and Karkala on Friday, to attend the mela on Saturday. But the Minister denied it and said that as he was in-charge for the elections in Delhi he has to leave early and left the venue after his inaugural speech.
D.V. Sadananda Gowda, who was supposed to inaugurate the exhibition stalls, also did not attend the mela.
District in-charge Minister B. Ramanath Rai is busy nowadays appealing for communal harmony in the backdrop of series of communal clashes. Responding to a query on the Bharatiya Hindu Parishad, founded by a Puttur Congress leader, at a press conference, Mr. Rai said that the Congress is committed to secularism. Going a step further to highlight his commitment to secularism, Mr. Rai said, “My religion is Congress.” This prompted a journalist to wonder whether the Minister would write ‘Congress’ in the column meant for ‘Religion’ in various application forms.
