Massive crowd gathering in Nehru Maidan, Mangalore

17-03-09 The Hindu Samajotsava organized by the Dharma Raksha Vedike on Sunday March 16, 2009 more than 40,000 people attended to strengthen and protect the Hindu religion and culture. Delivering the keynote address, Surendra Kumar Jain, secretary, central committee of the Vishwa Hindu Parishat, condemned the appeasement policies of political parties.
        He said Mangalore had sent a strong message against conversion activities and denigration of Hindu religion and culture by other religious groups. He also alleged that the previous state government was providing Haj subsidy to pilgrims using temple funds. "VHP would demand a comprehensive probe in this regard," he added. Sri Gurudevananda Swami of Odiyoor Mutt stressed the need for creating awareness against conversion and terrorism, which were main cause for unrest in the country.

 Dr. Jain also said “Those governments who do not stop the persecution of Hindus, do not respect their religion and allow killing of innocent Hindus by Pakistani and Bangladeshi terrorists and such governments will not have any future in this country.” He also said that the secular governments have accused Hindu sanths like kanchi Shankaracharya and Sadhvi Pragya Singh for no mistake of theirs. Plenty of such sanths and sadhvis were being victimized by the secular governments to support the Islamic and Christian activism in this country. Dr. Surendra Kumar Jain warned that the central intelligence has already mentioned that Kerala will be the Islamic terrorism hub for the south and the government there was more likely to fight and prevent the terrorists there.
         The Udupi Pejawar Math Swamiji Vishveshathirthsa called on the political parties not to bias the county on the basis of their size of their population. All the democratic nations in the world consider the majority community in charge of affairs and protected the minorities. But it is only in India that the majority interests are sacrificed to put minority interests into force. Mangalore saw about 15 to 20 religious leaders in the samajotsava today. The religious heads came all over from Udupi, Dakshina kannada and Kasargod. The religions included Jain, Shaiva, madhva, Vaishnava and others belonging to backward classes. According to the police, over one lack people had attended the Samajotsava.

Udupi National Highway-17 was blocked near Kaup on Sunday night by the Hindu activists, after a few miscreants reportedly threw stones at a bus carrying Hindu activists, who were returning home after attending the Hindu Samajotsava programme in Mangalore. The existence of a mosque in the vicinity created tensed moments for some time.  Though police rushed to the spot, they could not control the crowd numbering thousands. The situation was totally chaotic.

Infact, some of the police personnel were also injured in the melee. Udupi Superintendent of Police Praveen Pawar and four other personnel were injured. The police opened fire in the air to control the mob. As many as 15 persons have also been taken into custody. As a precautionary measure, the police have stopped movements of all vehicles going towards Kaup on the national highway.

The vehicles have been taking a diversion via Padubidre, Belman and Manchakal to reach Udupi. More police forces have been deployed to prevent any untoward incidents. Meanwhile, stone throwing on buses carrying Hindu activists at Vittal in Bantwal taluk has also been reported. However, no untoward incident has been reported from Vittal.
 

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