Karnataka Congress working president R Dhruvanarayana passes away
Mysuru: Working President of the Karnataka Congress R Dhruvanarayana, aged 61 years, died of heart attack here on Saturday morning.
Dhruvanarayana returned home on Friday night, after attending several events through the day.
After he suffered a heart attack early Saturday morning, he was taken to the DRM Multi Speciality Hospital in Vontikoppal, but passed away.
He is survived by his wife and two sons.
Dhruvanarayana joined the Congress in 1983. He contested the Assembly elections from Santemarahalli in 1999, but lost the polls. In 2004, he became an MLA for the first time after winning by a terribly close margin of one vote against JD(S) candidate A R Krishnamurthy. He was elected to the Assembly from Kollegal in 2008.
The following year, in 2009, he won the Lok Sabha polls from Chamarajanagar and retained the seat in 2014, winning by a huge margin of 1,41,182 votes. In 2019, however, he lost the seat to Srinivas Prasad.
Several leaders of the Congress have expressed grief at the death of Dhruvanarayana, who had been active in the work of the party in Karnataka for several decades.
Karnataka Congress working president R Dhruvanarayana passed away: Dr Manjunath, Doctor DRMS Hospital
— ANI (@ANI) March 11, 2023
He suffered chest pain and his driver picked him up at 6:40am. But he didn't survive.
(Pic: R Dhruvanarayana's Twitter account) pic.twitter.com/AZSa37Fbsi
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RSS cautions against using caste census as political tool
New Delhi: The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) has expressed caution over the caste census survey, urging that it should not be used as a political tool. While the organisation has not issued an official response to the Union government’s recent decision to conduct caste-based enumeration alongside the upcoming decadal census, sources indicate that the Sangh remains watchful of its implications.
The RSS, which has historically opposed caste-based segregation, supports the idea of sub-categorisation within Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and the introduction of a creamy layer—but insists this must be done through consultation and consensus with stakeholders.
This development comes shortly after Prime Minister Narendra Modi met RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat at the Prime Minister’s official residence, a meeting that has drawn attention amid the government’s announcement.
The Sangh has long championed the cause of Samajik Samarasta (social harmony), a campaign aimed at unifying Hindu society across caste lines. It has maintained that caste enumeration should not become a vehicle for political gain. In September last year, RSS chief spokesperson Sunil Ambekar, speaking in Palakkad, Kerala, emphasised that caste-related issues must be approached with sensitivity due to their impact on national unity and integrity.
“Such issues should not be handled based on elections or electoral politics,” Ambekar had said. He added that while collecting caste data for welfare purposes is an accepted practice, it must strictly serve the interests of underprivileged communities, and not be exploited for political advantage.
According to the RSS, it has no objection to caste data collection if it is used for public welfare rather than for fostering political divisions. Observers suggest that this nuanced endorsement has provided the Modi government the ideological clearance to proceed without alienating its traditional support base.
With ground-level implementation already visible in states like Bihar and ideological alignment at the national level, the caste census is poised to significantly influence India’s social policy and electoral strategies. For a nation still striving for equitable representation and social justice, the exercise could supply much-needed empirical data to guide policy decisions.
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