Tejasvi Surya, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Member of Parliament from Bengaluru South, on Tuesday night tweeted a video alleging that a man was beaten up and humiliated by Congress workers for insulting Karnataka Chief Minister and senior Congress leader Siddaramaiah. In the video, a man is seen on his knees in front of a Siddaramaiah poster, as if to suggest he is begging for forgiveness. The two men surrounding him can be heard shouting at the person and the man standing to his left even slaps him twice.
Assaulted for calling names?
While the two men beating the victim can be heard talking in Kannada, it is clear that they keep reciting the word "Siddramullah" and "Siddramullah Khan", giving the impression that the man was roughed up for calling Siddaramaiah names.
Moral policing issue raised
Tejasvi in his tweet also attached the byte of senior Congress leader and Karnataka Home Minister G Parameshwara, where the senior leader had said that "moral policing needs to stop" as people were fed up of it in Mangaluru, Dakshina Kannada. However, Tejasvi took a jibe at the Congress leaders' comment and said in his tweet, "As charity begins at home, it would be great if he could start with this case where two Congress workers beat up a common man in Bengaluru on the pretext that he spoke against the CM."
Background
In the run-up to the recently concluded and fiercely fought Karnataka assembly elections, BJP leader CT Ravi (who lost from Chikmagalur seat), had called Siddaramaiah as "Siddramullah Khan" for allegedly speaking positively about Tipu Sultan. Siddramaiah had then responded by saying that he did not mind being called "Siddramullah Khan". Congress won Karnataka with a thumping majority by winning 135 seats in the 224-member house.
