The event started with a formal speech by Suhail Ahmed Maroor who also read out the Preamble of the Constitution aloud for the audience present to repeat it. Followed by Yaseen Malpe who asserted that the Karnataka’s Muslims (about 13% of the state’s population as per Census 2011) played a significant role in the 2023 mandate by ensuring voter participation from within the community, and thereby ousting the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from power. Now, he said, the convention representing the Muslims community seeks clarity on the promises made, not just assurances.

The convention’s report, formally submitted to the Chief Minister, Deputy Chief Minister, Ministers and MLAs/MLCs, promised to reach Leader of the Opposition (LOP), Rahul Gandhi as well. The convention positions itself as an exercise in constitutional responsibility and democratic accountability, not confrontation.

The convention held aimed to:

• Review key promises made to Muslims and minorities by the Congress during and after the 2023 Assembly election (Manifesto promises)
• Acknowledge steps taken, but highlight gaps in delivery and pending implementation.
• Seek a time‑bound, credible roadmap on unresolved commitments.
• Assert/remind the Congress party about the promises made through 10 demands.

The 10 key promises / issue areas

1. Action against communal hate organisations

• Manifesto promise: Firm action against individuals and organisations spreading communal hatred.
• Concerns raised: Despite that promise, RSS and affiliates are said to hold large numbers of public programmes, processions and rallies, including in sensitive areas near mosques, with limited preventive action. At the same time, civil society and student groups reportedly face more difficulty getting permissions for peaceful gatherings, leading to a perception of selective administration.
• Demand: Consistent, visible enforcement against habitual hate offenders, fake‑news networks, moral policing, cattle vigilantism, economic boycotts and organised intimidation, beyond just FIRs. 

2. Hijab Government Order – assurance vs formal withdrawal

• Background: The Hijab Government Order of February 5, 2022 is described as one of the most painful symbols of exclusion for Muslim girls in Karnataka. In December 2023, the CM publicly said his government would withdraw the order and that women should be free to wear what they want.
• Impact cited: Rights’ groups report is quoted, documenting rights impacts (education, dignity, privacy, expression, non‑discrimination) and noting that 1,010 Muslim girls aged 16–18 dropped out of college, partly due to the hijab policy.
• Finally, in May 2026 the order was withdrawn allowing religious symbols including the hijab be worn in schools and colleges.
• Question: Though the Convention and the Muslim community welcomed this step with open arms, the question arose as to why it took the ruling party about 3 years to withdraw the order. 

3. Cattle slaughter law – promise of repeal vs “no proposal”

• Law: Karnataka Prevention of Slaughter and Preservation of Cattle Act, 2020.
• The report notes the Act’s impact on farmers, traders, butchers, transporters, leather and hide workers, small eateries and Muslim meat traders.
• Congress had politically opposed this law and promised to repeal “unjust and anti‑people” BJP‑era laws within one year.
• However, in July 2023, the Animal Husbandry Minister stated in a written reply there was no proposal to repeal the Act, which media flagged as inconsistent with the party’s earlier stance.
• Demand: A legislative correction that aligns practice with the manifesto promise- review and repeal/replace the 2020 Act. 

4. Restoration of 4% Muslim/Category 2B reservation

• Issue: The previous BJP Government scrapped the 4% OBC quota for Muslims (Category 2B) and redistributed it to Vokkaliga and Lingayat categories.
• In 2023, senior Congress leaders, including the DCM, publicly promised that a Congress government would restore the 4% in the very first Cabinet meeting.
• Media and roundtables repeated this as a categorical assurance.
• Concern: It was flagged that this key reservation promise remains unresolved, despite being one of the clearest pre‑poll commitments.
• Demand: Full restoration of the 4% Category 2B reservation, backed by an explicit Cabinet and legislative decision. 

5. Repeal of the anti‑conversion law

• Law: Karnataka Protection of Right to Freedom of Religion Act, 2022 (“anti‑conversion law”).
• On June 15, 2023, the Cabinet decided to repeal this law and stated a repeal Bill would be introduced in the July 2023 session. According to media reports cited, the government later did not table that Bill in the Budget Session, leaving the law in force.
• The report calls this “announcement without completion”: a Cabinet decision that never became legislation.
• Demand: Introduce and pass the repeal Bill so the law is actually taken off the statute book. 

6. ₹10,000 crore annual minority welfare commitment

• Manifesto promise: Raise annual allocations for minorities (Muslims, Christians, Jains, Buddhists, others) to ₹10,000 crore.
• Current status: PRS budget analysis cited in the report shows ₹4,762 crore allocated for minority welfare in 2026–27- less than half the promised figure and under 1% of the total budget.
• The report released notes positive steps, such as upgrading 117 Maulana Azad Model and Urdu schools to Karnataka Public Schools with ₹600 crore, plus 100 more schools with ₹400 crore.
• Concern: Welcome but not at the scale implied by the ₹10,000 crore promise; welfare expansion remains significantly below commitment.
• Demand: Move towards the full ₹10,000 crore annual allocation, with clear focus on education, livelihoods, infrastructure, scholarships and institutions. 

7. Waqf protection and administration

• Context: Waqf properties – mosques, madrasas, health centres, orphanages- are described as major religious and charitable assets of the community.
• The report refers to “systemic failure” in Waqf administration, citing encroachment, illegal sale/transfer, undervalued leases, misuse, weak legal action, and staff shortages.
• It acknowledges initiatives like UMEED digitisation and repair grants as positive but limited steps.
• Demand:

• Stronger measures against encroachment and illegal alienation.
• Better litigation capacity, tribunal strength, administrative staffing.
• Strategic development of under‑utilised Waqf assets, not only minor repairs. 

8. Reservation ceiling, caste survey and social justice architecture

• The report links Muslim issues to broader social justice architecture in Karnataka:

• The need to table and implement caste survey data.
• Addressing the 50% reservation ceiling through mechanisms like Ninth Schedule and OBC internal reservation.

• The argument: Without a clear framework on data, ceilings and internal categories, promises on Muslim reservation (2B) and OBC justice cannot be sustainably implemented.
• Demand:

• Make caste survey data public and act on it.
• Explore constitutional routes to adjust reservation ceilings and internal reservations in line with social realities. 

9. Education – progress but not a full pipeline

• There are some visible positive steps: Maulana Azad Model Schools, Urdu school upgrades, hostels, scholarships, women’s colleges, coaching and loans.
• Core point: Minority education still functions as disconnected schemes, not a “school‑to‑employment pipeline”.
• Gaps identified: Staffing, utilisation, course coverage, scholarship adequacy, hostel capacity, professional pathways and competitive exam success.
• Demand:

• Treat minority education as an integrated education and human capital strategy, from school to jobs, not fragmented welfare. 

10. Special Intensive Revision (SIR) and voting rights

• The report treats Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls as a crucial democratic issue: Ensuring Muslim voters are not wrongly deleted or left out before damage is done.
• Concern: Without close monitoring and corrective mechanisms, SIR could result in disenfranchisement in Muslim‑concentrated areas.
• Demand: Proactive steps to protect voting rights, including transparency, grievance redressal and timely corrections before elections.

The convention and the report frames its demands as a call for:

• Clear timelines (Monsoon Session 2026, Budget 2027, before May 2028).
• Legislative and budgetary follow‑through, not just statements.
• A “constructive partnership” between government and the Muslim community, grounded in measurable outcomes and institutional accountability.

The convention’s tone today was not confrontational. It was constitutional – a community reminding a government that votes create accountability, not just mandate.

The harder question now is not whether Congress will respond. It’s whether the Muslim community will, by 2028, still be waiting for the same ten answers – with a fresh set of promises attached. Because if the pattern holds, the next round of “acceptable” leaders is already being prepared to deliver those promises.

And the round after that is already being quietly planned. 

(The author is Editor in chief, NewsHamster (NH), a portal that majorly covers Bengaluru and Karnataka related stories.)

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The post A Reminder Congress Didn’t Ask For: Karnataka Muslim convention demands accountability from the Congress appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The Davangere South trigger

The ongoing Davangere South by-election has crystallised these long-simmering grievances. The Congress decision to field Samarth Mallikarjun, heir to the Shamanur political family, instead of a Muslim candidate in a constituency with around 75,000–80,000 Muslim voters out of roughly 2.3 lakh has sparked visible anger and protest on the ground. Reports of community leaders and youth expressing resentment, coupled with calls for a Muslim candidate, have put the national party on the defensive. Senior Muslim functionaries have privately and publicly acknowledged disquiet over a pattern where Muslim votes are treated as guaranteed, but Muslim claims to candidature are treated as negotiable.

The Davangere episode is not an isolated misstep. For many Muslim leaders, it is merely the latest entry in a long ledger of slights, broken expectations, and what feels like deliberate undercutting of community leadership within the Congress.

The 2012 MLC election: a warning sign

The 2012 MLC election in Karnataka, when the BJP was in power and Congress sat in opposition, is remembered by many as an early warning. The party had to pick three candidates from the Assembly to the Legislative Council: C Motamma, an established woman leader; MR Seetharam; and Iqbal Ahmed Saradgi, a senior Muslim leader from Kalaburagi.

At this point, Opposition Leader Siddaramaiah is said to have demanded the Council seat for his close associate CM Ibrahim. When the party declined, Byrathi Suresh rebelled and contested the MLC election as an independent. The rebellion shook the party internally and created an atmosphere of uncertainty. In the end, Motamma and Seetharam won with 19 votes each, while Saradgi lost, and Byrathi Suresh emerged victorious with a significantly higher margin than any other candidate.

For many Muslim observers, the incident left two bitter impressions. First, that the factional tussle triggered around CM Ibrahim effectively jeopardised the lone Muslim candidate’s prospects. Second, that the party’s “damage control” later – including action against Suresh that quietly faded away – suggested that ensuring a Muslim win was never the system’s first priority. Within the community, it is now recalled as an early blow that foreshadowed how internal Congress power games could repeatedly come at the expense of Muslim representation.

Hebbal 2016: the CK Jaffer Sharief legacy sidelined

The 2016 Hebbal Assembly by-election is another case that fuels the current sense of grievance. The seat fell vacant after the death of BJP MLA Jagadish Kumar. In 2013, Congress’ CK Abdul Rehman Sharif – grandson of veteran leader and former Union Railway Minister CK Jaffer Sharief, a man credited with significant railway reforms and influence at the national level – had lost the seat by a relatively narrow margin of around 5,000 votes.

Given his political lineage, prior performance, and the constituency’s demographics, local Congress workers and observers believed Rehman Sharif was positioned to win the by poll if given a second chance. Instead, the contest saw accusations of internal manipulation and factional interference, with senior leaders and power brokers allegedly working in ways that undercut his campaign. The result was a decisive defeat – he reportedly lost by over 20,000 votes – and, in the subsequent 2018 election, the ticket went to Byrathi Suresh, who won and continues as MLA and now minister from Hebbal.

For many Muslims aligned with the Congress, Hebbal embodies a recurring pattern: Muslim candidates are projected as winnable only up to the point that they remain subordinate to entrenched caste and money networks. When their independent stature grows, or when they begin to look like serious power centres in their own right, they find themselves replaced or undermined.

Mysuru, Tanveer Sait, and the coalition years

The 2018 Congress–JD(S) coalition and the Mysuru city corporation elections brought another example into focus. Tanveer Sait, a long-time Muslim leader from Mysuru and son of heavyweight Azeez Sait, had been a minister in the previous government. However, local pressures and his tactical proximity to JD(S) leaders reportedly put him at odds with Siddaramaiah and sections of the Congress high command.

Though Tanveer Sait went on to win the 2023 Assembly election, he was denied a cabinet berth and instead accommodated only as a working president of the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee. For a leader with ministerial experience and a strong local base, this demotion is seen within the community as another case where the party’s internal calculations trumped recognition of a Muslim leader’s stature and seniority.

Roshan Baig: reformer to outcast

If there is one episode that symbolises the cost of dissent for Muslim leaders in the Congress, it is the ouster of Roshan Baig. A veteran leader and the only Muslim to have held the Home portfolio in Karnataka, Baig is widely credited with important police reforms and with establishing the Hajj Bhavan in Bengaluru, which has become a model for similar facilities elsewhere.

In 2019, following the Congress’ dismal Lok Sabha performance, winning only one seat from Karnataka – Baig publicly criticised Siddaramaiah, then AICC general secretary KC Venugopal, and state leadership for their handling of the elections. His outburst was followed by swift disciplinary action, culminating in his suspension and political isolation.

For many in the Muslim community, the message was clear: decades of loyalty and policy contributions did not protect Baig once he took on the central leadership. The party’s willingness to discard a senior Muslim face over internal criticism reinforced the perception that Muslim leaders are tolerated only so long as they remain unquestioningly loyal.

CM Ibrahim: a national figure walks away

The trajectory of CM Ibrahim adds a national dimension to this story. A stalwart who held key Union portfolios like Civil Aviation, Tourism, and Information & Broadcasting in the Deve Gowda and Gujral governments, Ibrahim has occupied prominent positions in both the Congress and JD(S). Over the years, however, his relationship with the Congress leadership—especially Siddaramaiah—deteriorated, and he eventually walked away from the party’s fold.

For grassroots Muslim cadres, Ibrahim’s estrangement is often cited as proof that even the tallest Muslim leaders are dispensable when their interests collide with dominant caste factions or leadership ambitions inside the Congress.

Lok Sabha numbers: the structural deficit

Beyond individual stories, the structural underrepresentation of Muslims in Karnataka’s parliamentary politics is stark. For a state with around 12–13% Muslim population, Karnataka has sent only one Muslim MP to the Lok Sabha in the last 20 years – Iqbal Ahmed Saradgi from Gulbarga in 2004 and Mansoor Ali Khan in 2024.

Data from recent elections shows that the Congress, BJP and JD(S) together have fielded only 11 Muslim candidates across four Lok Sabha polls between 2004 and 2019 – less than 10% of the 112 candidates the three parties collectively put up in that period. In 2004, there were four Muslim candidates from major parties; in 2009 and 2014, there were three each; by 2019 and 2024, that number dropped to just one. None of these candidates belonged to the BJP.

Political scientists and community leaders point to multiple reasons: the lack of clearly decisive Muslim “vote bank” parliamentary constituencies; the refusal of parties to groom Muslim leaders beyond community silos; and the rise of majoritarian polarisation as a deliberate electoral strategy. Delimitation in 2008, they argue, also reshaped constituencies in ways that further reduced the perceived winnability of Muslim candidates.

The case of Mansoor Ali Khan in Bengaluru Central, who recently lost by around 30,000 votes, is often read through this lens. From the community’s perspective, the issue is not just his defeat, but the sense that Kuruba, Lingayat and other caste blocs—who have long benefited from Muslim support in their own constituencies—did not mobilise with the same intensity for a Muslim candidate when it was their turn to reciprocate

Assembly level signals: Gangavati and beyond

The 2023 Assembly election in Gangavati added another layer to this community alienation. Iqbal Ansari, the Congress candidate, lost by 7,000–8,000 votes. Local accounts attribute the defeat not to lack of appeal but to internal sabotage: Lingayat and Kuruba factions, allegedly shaped by senior local leaders, were unwilling to back Ansari fully because his victory might have strengthened his claim for a cabinet berth in the future.

Similar stories are whispered from other constituencies where Muslims form a decisive part of the Congress vote base but remain underrepresented in ticket distribution and cabinet appointments. At the same time, Muslim voters have consistently rallied behind non-Muslim Congress candidates, from Bidar and Kalaburagi to Raichur, Koppal and Ballari—often playing a critical role in their victories.

A politics built on asymmetry

Taken together, these episodes and numbers suggest a deep asymmetry at the heart of Congress–Muslim relations in Karnataka. On one side stands a community that has repeatedly voted for the Congress to keep the BJP at bay and to defend secular space. On the other stands a party that has been increasingly cautious, even reluctant – about translating that loyalty into proportionate representation.

Davangere South has therefore become more than a by poll. It is a symbol. For many Muslims, it confirms a pattern: when there is a clash between dynastic claims, dominant caste interests, and Muslim representation, the latter is almost always the first to be sacrificed.

Conclusion: A Lesser Evil

The central grievance emerging from Karnataka’s Muslim electorate is not that the Congress has never fielded Muslim candidates, nor that it has never elevated Muslim leaders. The grievance is that these gestures have become rarer, more conditional, and more vulnerable to internal sabotage, even as the community continues to vote for the party in large numbers.

In an era where majoritarian politics is openly dismissive of Muslim concerns, the Congress still benefits from being seen as the lesser evil. But “lesser evil” is not a sustainable political identity. For a party that speaks the language of diversity and inclusion, Karnataka’s record on Muslim representation – particularly in Parliament – stands as an uncomfortable indictment.

Unless the Congress begins to treat Muslim representation not as a risk but as a rightful outcome of long-term loyalty, the disconnect between its rhetoric and its ticket distribution will only widen. Davangere South is a test, but it is also a mirror. The question facing the party is simple: will it continue to rely on fear of the BJP to hold Muslim voters, or will it finally acknowledge and repay a political debt that has been accumulating for decades?

(The author is Editor in chief, NewsHamster (NH), a portal that majorly covers Bengaluru and Karnataka related stories.)

Related:

Karnataka: Hindutva groups call for economic boycott of Muslim vendors at Siddheshwar Temple

In line with the approaching Karnataka polls, BJP MLA KS Eshwarappa gives anti-Muslim speech

Supreme Court takes action amid outrage following Karnataka Judge’s anti-Muslim and gender-insensitive comments in court

The post Congress and Karnataka’s Muslims: Loyalty without Representation appeared first on SabrangIndia.