Karnataka - Madikeri   

DSS members demand installation of Ambedkar's statue at Madikeri

Staff Correspondent

MADIKERI: In a unique demonstration members of the Dalit Sangarsha Samiti (DSS), who had gathered from different parts of Kodagu here on Friday, staged "Urulu Seve" to press for their demands.

Several of them started rolling on the road from the General Thimayya Circle to the Deputy Commissioner's office in the Fort. One of their demands was the installation of a statue of B.R. Ambedkar in the city.

The protestors, numbering around 300, were enraged when the jeep of the Zilla Panchayat president H.S. Ashok entered the fort while they were performing the "Urulu Seve". The Dalits lay down in front of the jeep preventing it from moving forward. Police intervened to push the jeep back. The DSS agitation was led by Dalit leader H.L. Diwakar.

When municipal tahsildar Tulasi arrived at the spot to pacify the agitators, along with Deputy Director of the Department of Food and Civil Supplies Devoor, the protestors demanded that the Deputy Commissioner be present.

Deputy Commissioner Subodh Yadav arrived at the spot around 1.30 p.m. and a memorandum was handed over to him by DSS members. Some of their demands were, granting five acres of land each to Dalits, providing them with BPL ration cards, making compulsory visits to the Backward Community and Minority hostels every month to monitor their functioning, providing basic amenities to Dalit colonies and appointing teachers to the city municipal schools in Madikeri.

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