By TwoCircles.net Staff Reporter,
Bangaluru: After revoking BJP introduced harsher cow slaughtering bill, the Congress government in Karnataka has now decided to celebrate the birth anniversary of the 18th century legendary king Tipu Sultan as a state event.
On expected lines, the decision has not gone down well with the state BJP, which has termed the attempt of the ruling party to strengthen its vote bank. The saffron party has decided to lodge protest terming Tipu Sultan as a tyrant “who forcibly converted people.”
Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on December 22 announced that the government has decided to celebrate “Tipu Jayanti” and the date would be decided shortly. “There has been a lot of pressure from various quarters to celebrate Tipu Jayanti. We have decided to take this into consideration and will announce the date shortly,” Siddaramaiah had said during one of the functions.
“We (BJP) have our own viewpoint on Tipu Sultan about his administration, especially when you go to Coorg (Kodagu) and other places, where people still remember the barbaric acts committed against Coorgis, who refused to oblige his dictates. So, Tipu cannot be considered as a person, whose birthday should be celebrated by the state government,” BJP leader Suresh Kumar had told PTI.
State Legislative Council chairman and senior state BJP leader D H Shankarmurthy told PTI that the government has all the rights to celebrate Tipu’s birthday, but the Mysuru ruler was “anti-Kannada.”
“Before Tipu ruled Mysuru, Kannada was the official language. He replaced Kannada with Persian, which was an alien language,” he said. Moreover, Tipu was not a Kannadiga and he forced conversions in Kodagu and Dakshina Kannada and Kerala, he claimed.
Countering Siddaramaiah’s remarks that Tipu supported temples and gave money to construct them, Shankamurthy said no one can also ignore his acts of demolishing temples. “There may be few instances of Tipu supporting construction of temples by giving money, but it is also true he demolished many temples. A debate has to be held as to why Tipu supported some and demolished other temples,” he argued.
Who was Tipu Sultan?
Tipu Sultan was the ruler of the erstwhile kingdom of Mysore. Known as the Tiger of Mysore due to his courage, strength and mainly due to his famous fight with a tiger during which he managed to kill tiger, Tipu was also a religious scholar, a soldier and a poet.
During his rule he introduced number of administrative innovations, including his coinage, a new Mauludi lunisolar calendar and a new land revenue system which initiated the growth of Mysore silk industry. He expanded the iron-cased Mysorean rockets and wrote the military manual Fathul Mujahidin, considered a pioneer in the use of rocket artillery.