Kannada-speaking residents of 42 villages of Jath taluk of Sangli district in Maharashtra plan to march to the Suvarna Vidhana Soudha in Belagavi city to draw the attention of the Karnataka government towards their plight due to alleged discrimination and negligence by the Maharashtra government.
The residents, who are observing hunger strike in their respective villages for the past few days, would present their tale of woes to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah during the monsoon session of the legislature from June 29 to July 10, said Belagavi District Kannada Organisations Action Committee president Ashok Chandargi here on Wednesday.
He said Jath taluk had a high population of the Kannada linguistic community. The residents of 42 villages under the banner of ‘Jath Taluk Gadinadu Sangharsh Samithi’ had been venting their anger against Maharashtra government’s “step-motherly treatment” — by ignoring their need for basic amenities such as safe drinking water — for the past several decades. There was a strong feeling of “neglected community”, which has led to their demand for merger with Karnataka, he said.
Mr. Chandargi said that the fact was that the merger of all villages with Kannada-speaking population from Maharashtra to Karnataka and vice-versa was “impossible”, except for those listed in Meher Chand Mahajan Commission Report, 1962.
He said a similar situation prevailed in 22 villages of Athani taluk of Belagavi district over 16 years ago. The then Rural Development Minister M.Y. Ghorpade in the S.M. Krishna government had visited some of these villages where the residents were agitating for merger of their villages into Maharashtra because of woes similar to those of Jath.
Development works
The government responded positively and sanctioned Rs. 24 crore to take up various development works, eventually resulting in the villagers giving up their demand for merger.
However, the Maharashtra government seemed to remain “discriminative” in its attitude towards ‘Gadi Kannadigas’ living along the border areas, Mr. Chandargi said. Mr. Siddaramaiah should take serious note of their problems and take up the issue with his Maharashtra counterpart, he said.
