Writer Chandrashekar Patil strongly criticised the lack of progress in pinpointing the culprits responsible for scholar MM Kalburgi’s death, and wondered if 5,000-year-old Brahminical fundamentalism or newer Veerashaiva and Lingayat fundamentalism was responsible for Kalburgi’s death.
On the first anniversary of Kalaburgi’s death, a jatha was organized from Kalburgi’s house in Dharwad city, in which several of the biggest Kannada writers participated. Kalburgi’s wife too marched with protesters, wearing a black arm band.
Kalburgi was murdered in his house on August 30, 2015, by unidentified persons reportedly travelling on a motorbike.
Addressing a gathering of a few thousand people in a public meeting after the jatha, Patil said that the investigation had come to a dead end, with the police unable to apprehend the writer’s killer even a year after his murder.
“There is a suspicion that sectarian forces are hindering the investigation. Both the ruling and opposition parties are creating obstacles. Which fundamentalism is to blame for his death? Brahminical fundamentalism is 5,000 years old. A revolution against it erupted in the 12th century (in the form of the Veerashaiva movement spearheaded by Basavanna). It is a tragedy that communalism grew on the shoulders of Veerashaivas and Lingayats in the name of the sharanas and Basavanna, who revolted against brahminism,” Patil said.
A socio-political churning occurred in Karnataka following Kalburgi’s murder in August 2015. As weeks passed with no solid leads on the killer, several Kannada writers returned their literary awards over what they said was the failure of the state government. Some writers were also threatened by Hindutva activists.