A long overdue demand from Dalit activists was recently realized with private city and suburban buses playing with BR Ambedkar Circle instead of Jyoti Circle on their destination boards.
After the name of “Jyoti Circle” was changed to “BR Ambedkar Circle”, Dalit activists were demanding action by the authorities for mentioning city buses on destination boards. Apart from raising it at the district level SC / ST grievances meeting, the activists raised it at the district road safety meeting. This was raised on 28 February in several SC / ST grievance meetings held at the office of the Commissioner of Police headed by Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) Hariram Shankar.
“A few days ago, Mr. Shankar told us about the demand. “We came out with the stickers of BR Ambedkar Circle and it was pasted in most of the buses passing through the circle on Tuesday,” said Dilraj Alva, president of Dakshina Kannada Bus Owners Association. The association received 400 stickers of BR Ambedkar Circle. In the presence of some Dalit activists and traffic police, the members of the association stopped some city buses in the circle and pasted stickers on Tuesday morning. Later, they went to the city bus terminus at State Bank and pasted stickers on the buses.
Vishwanath Chintamir, a Dalit Sangharsh Samiti activist from Bantwal, said, “We are happy with the way the city police took up the issue with the city bus operators and paved the way to meet our long-standing demand.” . ” Despite the instructions of the then Deputy Commissioner KG Jagdish, the city bus operators had failed to mention BR Ambedkar Circle on the route boards, he said.
Another activist, Vishukumar, said that a response was expressed in a recent letter by Mr. Shankar to the chief managers of some of the major banks in the city that SC / ST applicants face problems in obtaining loans. “The official letter has prompted banks to process our applications without any hassle,” he said.
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