Bengaluru: State tourism minister C T Ravi has slammed Shiv Sena and former Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis on their statements that Karnataka has encroached certain parts of Maharashtra.
Addressing the media on Monday, he said, “I strongly condemn the ‘encroachment’ statement by the Shiv Sena and former CM Fadnavis. They are trying to create tensions by touching upon the aspect of regionalism. If they intend to provoke the sentiment of Kannadigas, we will revolt against it.”
“It is very shocking to see that person like Devendra Fadnavis is making such a statement. There are several parts in Maharashtra which have more number of Kannadigas. It would be a silly thing to say that those areas come under Karnataka”, he added.
Criticizing and warning the leaders in Maharashtra, C T Ravi said, “When Prime Minister Narendra Modi is trying to unite everyone in this country, some of the leaders from the neighbouring states are trying to divide the country on linguistic lines. This is not acceptable. There is no compromise when it comes to any matter related to Karnataka.”
Meanwhile, lashing out at Shiv Sena he said, “Shiv Sena only speaks about matters which cannot happen practically. It is better that they look into their matters and solve them first, rather than poking their nose into other matters.”
It can be recalled that yesterday, Devendra Fadnavis had claimed that Belagavi, Karwar and some of the other border areas, where there were more number of Marathi speaking community should belong to Maharashtra.
Tension gripped border areas of Belagavi after Sena rake up the language and border issue couple of days ago.