From Our Special Correspondent
Daijiworld Media Network - Bangalore

Bangalore, Apr 20: Obviously elated by the unambiguous endorsement and support extended by most of the Seers and leaders of the politically powerful Lingayat community to the B S Yeddyurappa-led BJP Government in Karnataka through its Akhila Bharata Veerashaiva Mahasabha, which held its three-day conference in Mysore, Excise Minister M P Renukacharya accused the opposition JD(S) led by Vokkaliga stalwart H D Deve Gowda of trying to divide the community.

Renukachaya, who himself is a Lingayat, said the JD(S) supremo H D Deve Gowda and his son H D Kumaraswamy, former chief minister, were bent upon creating problems for the Yeddyurappa regime merely because the Chief Minister belonged to the Lingayat community and was close to almost all the Lingayat seers.

The minister, who started off as a staunch loyalist of Yeddyurappa and later turned dissident till he succeeded in becoming a cabinet minister, reversed the cycle again and has now become a most vocal champion among the ministers in the cabinet, contended that the former prime minister and his sons as well as other family members were ''utilising former ministers Basavaraj Horatti and Basavaraj Patil Yatnal, both Lingayat leaders, to make statements against the Veerashaiva community.’’

''The Lingayat community can see through this game and would not tolerate such derogatory statements against seers,’’ Renukacharya warned.

Horatti had alleged that most Veerashaiva seerswere indulging in politics behind the scene and it would be better if they entered active politics. Some of the seers of Veerashaiva community were using caste as a cover-up for the misdeeds of the Chief Minister, Horatti said in Hubli recently.

Yatnal too issued a statement of organising another conference of Veershaiva community to counter the leadership of Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa.

Renukacharya said th ethree-day, 22nd Maha Adhiveshana of the Akhila Bharata Veerashaiva Mahasabha held at Mysore has backed the leadership of Mr Yeddyurappa for doing development works in the State.

Several sects in the community remained backward and the Mahasabha took a decision to solve the unemployment among the community’s youth, he said.