BANGALORE: Situation in the IT capital of India continues to be tensed for the second day on Tuesday following the kidnapping of popular Karnataka matnee idol Rajkumar by forest brigand and sandalwood smuggler Veerappan. Most of the establishments remain closed as buses are off the road.
Mr Rajkumar, who has a large fan following in the state, was kidnapped from his farm house, situated in the thick forest range bordering Tamil Nadu and Karnataka on Sunday night. Rajkumar fans were on the roads in the early hours of Monday stopping all movements of traffic and forcing shops and offices to down their shutters. The entire business in the city came to standstill after a total bandh was called to oppose the kidnapping. Locals gave vent to their ire by burning buses and other vehicles and pelting stones at shops at several places of the city.
Towards later in the day, the public started targeting the Tamil community as Veerappan hails from Tamil Nadu. All the Tamil TV channels were banned in the city, while some of the offices of Tamil newspaper were pelted.
Almost all the IT companies declared holiday. There were reports of at least one Infosys bus being burnt down on Monday. According to reports, those Wipro staff who managed to reach their offices were had to spend the night there as the company could not run its buses in the evening. Most of Wipro’s buses carry Tamil Nadu registration number. Many IT professionals were forced to walk long distance back home as transport buses too were taken off the road by afternoon.
There were no signs of improvement on Tuesday, though no fresh incidents of violence have come so far. Shops were opened for a couple of hours in some localities in the city on Tuesday. They were later forced to close down in the afternoon. Prohibitory orders under Section 144 have been clamped in the entire city for a week to ensure no further violence and arson.
According to sources, the improvement of the situation on Wednesday would depend on the developments of the talks with Veerappan.