Islamophobic Remarks :
Hindu seer Siddalinga Swami is connected to the Karuneshwara Mutt (Hindu monastery) in Andola, Karnataka. He represents Sri Rama Sene, a militant Hindu group, as state president of Karnataka.
Swami is a notably severe Islamophobe who is well-known for his anti-Muslim views. A long list of cases against him have been dropped as a result of his blatantly hateful statements, which have sent him to prison more than once.
Hindu seer Siddalinga Swami is connected to the Karuneshwara Mutt (Hindu monastery) in Andola, Karnataka. He represents Sri Rama Sene, a militant Hindu group, as state president of Karnataka.
Swami is a notably severe Islamophobe who is well-known for his anti-Muslim views. A long list of cases against him have been dropped as a result of his blatantly hateful statements, which have sent him to prison more than once.
When he said that student demonstrators should “meet the same fate” as the assassinated writer and activist Gauri Lankesh in 2020, the leader of Sri Ram Sene triggered yet another uproar.
“Despite only being 14 to 15 years old, they are disparaging Modi and Shah. The crowd cheered as Swami continued, “I think they should be forced to go where Gauri Lankesh is shortly.
On September 5, 2017, Lankesh, a veteran journalist and editor of the Gauri Lankesh Patrike in Karnataka, was fatally shot at her Bengaluru home in Raja Rajeshwari Nagar.
She was known to be a staunch critic of the right wing, and the killing had shocked the country. One of the key arrests in the case was that of Parashuram Waghmore, with links to Sri Ram Sene and its chief Pramod Muthalik.
He publicly urges for violence and provides incentives and bounties for murders. He allegedly offered a 300,000 rupee bounty at a public meeting in Kannada, Karnataka for anyone who would “chop off the tongues” of the three Kashmiri students who were detained for allegedly screaming pro-Pakistan slogans. He declared, “The Sri Ram Sene will reward whomever cuts off those tongues and delivers them with Rs 1 lakh for each tongue, for a total of Rs 300,000. Such anti-nationals don’t belong in this country or state. The Sri Ram Sene is prepared to confront those who are against the nation.
Swami was one of the representatives of Hindu religious groups who passionately requested a law prohibiting religious conversions when they met with Basavaraj Bommai, the then-chief minister of Karnataka, in 2021. In September 2022, the Karnataka assembly passed an anti-conversion bill that has been used as a tool to accuse Muslims and Christians of making “forced religious conversions” while in reality they have not.
Swami organized campaigns to have mosque loudspeakers taken down and petitioned the Karnataka government to outlaw the Azaan (Muslim call to prayer). Therefore, the Karnataka government issued regulations prohibiting the use of loudspeakers from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. His group, under his direction, incited Hindu feelings against “Halal” meat (meat obtained through the Islamic method of animal sacrifice), and it also inspired Hindu youngsters to wear saffron scarves in opposition to Muslim girls wearing the hijab in colleges and schools. Notably, by maintaining the state government’s order prohibiting the hijab in schools, the Karnataka High Court’s decision in the case also failed to defend Muslim girls’ right to wear the head covering.
In March 2023 a local court in Karnataka held Swami guilty on a charge of hate speech which he had delivered in 2015 at a public function organized by the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) at the Government Junior College Grounds in Yadgir, Karnataka.
His social media accounts are filled with visuals of anti-Muslim propaganda campaigns.