Dy CM Shivakumar asks employers to grant leave to Kerala workers for local body polls
Bengaluru (PTI): Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar on Wednesday appealed to employers across Karnataka to grant paid leave to workers from Kerala so that they can return home to vote in the upcoming local body election in that state.
The elections are scheduled to be held on December 9 and 11.
Shivakumar, who is also the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee President, said a large number of Kerala residents live and work in Bengaluru and other parts of Karnataka, and emphasised the need to support them in exercising their democratic right.
He urged all companies, educational institutions, commercial establishments, hotels, contractors, builders, shop owners and other business operators to provide a minimum of three days of paid leave to eligible voters.
This, he said, would allow them to travel to Kerala and cast their vote without financial loss. Shivakumar requested employers to cooperate fully and enable Kerala-origin workers to participate actively in the electoral process.
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Congress using hijab issue to pacify minority anger, alleges Karnataka LoP R Ashoka
Bengaluru: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R. Ashoka has accused the Congress government of using the hijab issue to placate what he described as discontent among minority voters after the Davanagere by-election.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Ashoka alleged that the state government, instead of addressing issues such as price rise, corruption, farmers’ distress and law and order, was attempting to retain its minority vote base by reviving the hijab issue.
Referring to the 2022 dress code introduced by the BJP government, which prohibited hijab in schools and colleges, Ashoka said the Karnataka High Court had upheld the policy and emphasised the importance of discipline in educational institutions.
He questioned the Congress government’s move to revisit the issue and asked whether setting aside the court-backed policy to benefit one community could be described as secularism.
Ashoka further alleged that while the government was willing to permit hijab, it continued to prohibit saffron shawls.
He accused the government of dividing students on religious lines rather than treating schools and colleges as spaces of equality.
Drawing a comparison with Mamata Banerjee’s government in West Bengal, Ashoka claimed that excessive appeasement politics had harmed the state and warned that the Congress in Karnataka could face a similar political response.
He said voters in Karnataka would teach the Congress a lesson for what he termed “vote-bank politics” and for compromising constitutional and judicial principles.
