New Delhi: Pramod Muthalik, chief of the fringe Hindutva group Sri Ram Sene — known for its moral policing antics, including famously dragging women out of pubs on at least one occasion in 2009 — lost from Karkal in Udupi district. Incumbent BJP MLA V Sunill Kumar won the seat by a margin of 4,600 votes in a closely contested fight.
Muthalik secured 4,508 votes. He contested the polls as an Independent.
There were apprehensions within the BJP about a split in the Hindu vote owing to the entry of several rebel candidates in the fray in Karkala.
Muthalik contested against Kumar, the incumbent BJP MLA and a state minister, in Karkala. While on the campaign trail, Muthalik had alleged that the BJP had not done enough for Hindutva, despite having sought votes in its name.
“Under pressure from karyakartas (workers), I decided to contest as an Independent from the Karkala seat. Already, I have travelled across the constituency seven or eight times, and everyone is of the opinion that Muthalik should contest from here as there has been an injustice to Hindus and rampant corruption,” Muthalik told reporters while announcing his candidature in January this year.
He added, “My contest will be with an aim to give the Hindus justice and respect.”
Sri Ram Sene first hit national headlines when its members stormed a pub in Mangalore in 2009 and were seen dragging and assaulting women. In a statement to the media at the time, Muthalik had said that “bars and pubs should only be for men” and that the outfit led by him “wanted to ensure that all women in Mangalore were home by 7 pm”.
“These girls come from all over India, drink, smoke, and walk around in the night spoiling the traditional girls of Mangalore. Why should girls go to pubs? Are they going to serve their future husbands alcohol? Should they not be learning to make chapattis,” he had remarked.
Sri Ram Sene has in the past called for razing mosques and threatened to storm Muslim places of worship if azaan is played on loudspeakers.
Muthalik had told ThePrint in the run-up to the elections that the BJP “doesn’t support people like me who fight for a cause (Hindutva). So, we have decided to go independent”.
Divisive character in Karnataka politics
A divisive player in Karnataka politics, Muthalik was previously a member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Bajrang Dal, the youth wing of the Vishva Hindu Parishad. After a fallout with the RSS and the BJP in 2005, he quit the Bajrang Dal over its “lack of commitment towards Hindutva ideology” and founded the Karnataka unit of the Shiv Sena.
A year later, Muthalik quit the Shiv Sena over the Belagavi border dispute and formed the Rashtriya Hindu Sena, the parent organisation of the Sri Ram Sene.
In 2009, he was questioned by the Maharashtra Anti Terrorism Squad (ATS) over the Sri Ram Sene’s alleged involvement in the 2006 Malegaon blast case. While no evidence was found against the outfit, The Hindu had quoted Muthalik saying at a public meeting in 2009, “Malegaon incident is just a ‘jhalak’ (curtain-raiser) for similar events in the future.”
In 2008, the Sri Ram Sene also allegedly vandalised M.F. Husain’s paintings in New Delhi to register a protest against the artist.
Muthalik joined the BJP in 2014 and Pralhad Joshi, the party’s state chief at the time, welcomed him into the fold. However, he was shunted out within five hours owing to massive protests within the party.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)