Anantkumar Hegde apologizes for Kannada remarks after BJP top brass step in

BENGALURU:

Union minister Anantkumar Hegde

, who has claimed a majority of

Kannadigas

do not know proper

Kannada

, on Sunday apologized for “hurting the people of Karnataka”.

Hegde’s turnaround came soon after Union minister and BJP incharge of Karnataka Prakash Javadekar reportedly called him to convey the party’s displeasure over his remarks and asked him to clarify things to save the party from further embarrassment.

BJP state leaders, however, neither denied not confirmed Javadekar’s intervention. Hegde is yet to respond to a TOI’s message in this regard.

In a Facebook post, Hegde said his statement was twisted but he would not hesitate to seek apology if they had hurt the people.

“My concern was to protect our mother tongue from getting dead. The media has twisted my statement only to sensationalize the issue. Nonetheless, I apologize if I have hurt anyone,” Hegde said.

Only a few weeks ago, Hegde had done a similar volte-face after he was pulled up by his party over his remarks about changing the Constitution.

Hegde’s statement that barring those in Shivamogga, Uttara Kannada and Dakshina Kannada districts, people from Karnataka do not know proper Kannada had ruffled the feathers of not only pro-Kannada stalwarts such as Patil Puttappa but also a fellow BJP leader, former law minister S Suresh Kumar.

Taking strong exception to Hedge’s views, Suresh Kumar on Sunday urged the minister to take back his statement which he termed “unreasonable and insulting to the people of Karnataka.”

“Karnataka is a state with diverse culture and various dialects. From Bidar to Chamarajanagar, people speak Kannada in different styles and each dialect has its own charm. If you discriminate and choose to say only a particular dialect is superior, then you are only belittling the entire people of Karnataka,” said Suresh Kumar.

Even the BJP central leadership is understood to have taken strong objection to the comment and Union minister Prakash Javadekar is learnt have conveyed the party’s displeasure following which Hegde posted his apology.

Hegde, while inaugurating a training programme in Puttur on Saturday, aired his concerns over falling standards of language among people. He was especially worried about people’s indifference to learn Kannada. “These days, translating from English to Kannada is not a challenge, but it is a great challenge to get people to translate from Kannada to English. People cannot write good Kannada and it is hard to find someone who can translate things into chaste Kannada. Barring people from Shivamogga, Uttara Kannada and Dakshina Kannada, nobody else has the ability to translate into Kannada. The situation in Bengaluru especially is pathetic,” he claimed.

Suresh Kumar, however, counselled Hegde to be careful during public speeches, especially with elections around the corner.

“Being people representatives, we should be extremely careful. As his remarks are belittling the people of Karnataka and it has hurt them, I urge Hegde to take back his words,” said Suresh Kumar.

Hegde, however, defended himself before posting his video on Facebook, saying the media has twisted his statement while his concerns were about protection of language.

“In fact I thank the media for twisting my statement and sensationalizing it. They are doing this to me for the past two decades and I want them to continue and debate in their immature language,” Hegde stated.


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