Basanagounda Patil Yatnal is a seasoned politician from the southern state of Karnataka and is associated with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). He has been a member of the Karnataka legislative assembly for multiple terms and has also held ministerial positions in the Government of India.

Yatanl is quite notorious for his brazen anti-Muslim stance. He often indulges in hate-mongering and active violence against the Muslim community. In 2014 he was arrested by Karnataka Police from Kolhapur in Maharashtra on charges of instigating violence on members of the minority community in Bijapur at the time of Narendra Modi’s swearing-in as Prime Minister two days earlier

In June 2018 he said, “I never asked Muslims to vote for me, I had faith in Hindus that they would vote for me. Hindus are the ones who ensured my win in the elections. I will work to develop the Hindu community, not the Muslims.”

In a public gathering commemorating the Kargil victory in July 2018, he said, “Intellectuals enjoy the food, air, and water of this country… They give statements against the army and the country. The misfortune is of the country because these are intellectuals and secularists from our country. Yet they give such statements. If I become the home minister, I will order them to be lined up and shot.”

He threatened to shut all Madrassas ( Muslim educational institutions) in Karnataka if his party’s government would return to power.

On another occasion, while addressing a rally in Vijayapura, Karnataka he spewed venom against Muslims by saying, “All MLAs ask me, in your constituency, there are one lakh Tipu Sultans (Muslim votes) how a Shivaji Maharaj descendant won from Bijapur. Going forward in Bijapur, none of the followers of Tipu Sultan will win. Even by mistake, you should not cast your votes for Muslims.”

Yatnal has accused his own Party of offering him the Chief Minister’s position for a sum of twenty-five billion rupees. He said, “I don’t know this kind of theatrics, but if I did, then when Yeddyurappa ( the then Karnataka Chief Minister from the BJP) was removed, not this time but the last, they (a reference to BJP high command) would have made me chief minister,”

In response, Bhartiya Janata Party’s disciplinary committee issued a show cause notice against him for subversive activities against the party.