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Sonu Upadhyaya.

Integrity Score 100

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The indication by Animal Husbandry Minister K. Venkatesh that the anti-cow slaughter legislation would be withdrawn has triggered a political slugfest in Karnataka with the Opposition BJP set to hold its first State-wide protest against the Congress government on Monday and Tuesday.

It may be noted that bringing in the anti-cow slaughter legislation was on the priority list of the erstwhile BJP dispensation as it catered to its core ideology. The statement by the Congress Ministers that such a legislation would be withdrawn has ruffled the feathers of the BJP, which lost the recently held Karnataka Assembly polls.

“We will not allow the Congress government to withdraw the anti-cow slaughter legislation. We will stage a protest across the State on Monday and in Bengaluru on Tuesday against such a move,” BJP State general secretary and MLC N. Ravikumar told The Hindu. “We will intensify our agitation if the government does not change its plans,” he warned. Taking serious exception to the government fixing a ceiling for free power supply by considering the yearly average consumption of households, he described it as hoodwinking voters and said the party’s two-day protest would also cover these aspects.

Former Chief Minister and BJP leader Basavaraj Bommai too took exception to the Animal Husbandry Minister’s remarks as to why the old cows should not be slaughtered. In a series of tweets, he said: “We have an emotional bonding with cows and worship them. How can we demand that they be slaughtered?”

He remarked that the Minister might be making such remarks to ensure that the Chief Minister changes his portfolio. Otherwise, the Minister should be told to make suitable corrections in his functioning style, he said. He said cow slaughter was opposed first by Mahatma Gandhi.

Meanwhile, Congress leader and Minister Vinay Kulkarni, who is also a prominent dairy farmer of the State, opposed the anti-cow slaughter legislation and stressed the need for withdrawing it.