Karkala: Karkala police have arrested two individuals for putting up a defamatory banner against Muslims at Murathangady near Sanoor on Tuesday.
The accused are identified as Satish Devadiga, a local who had put up the banner, and Pushpalatha, the owner of ‘Amulya Graphics’ at Market Road, Karkala where the banner was printed. Karkala police who investigated the matter arrested the accused and presented them before the Karkala court. Releasing the printing press owner Pushpalatha on conditional bail, the court handed over Sathish to judicial custody.
The controversial banner had appeared at Kamalaksha Nagara near Murathangady on Monday. It used abusive language against the local Muslim community and warned them not to ‘lay hands on Hindu girls’. Accused Satish had printed his name and photo in the banner, calling himself ‘one of the freedom fighter’. Locals say that the accused is a 50-year old daily wager who was suffering from mental illness from last 5-6 years.
Accused Sathish was currently residing with his younger brothers, as his wife and children had abandoned him. Few residents alleged that as he was mentally unstable, certain anti-social elements could have used his name to publish the banner so as to cause unrest in the society. Kamalaksha Nagara is a place of communal harmony and such attempts to instigate communal discord must be nipped in the bud, the locals demanded.
