Belagavi: Entrepreneur, educationist and BJP Rajya Sabha member Prabhakar Basaprabhu Kore from here is an enterprising man in his own right and in his own domain.
When the BJP national executive met in Bengaluru earlier this month, he was part of a delegation that met prime minister Modi and party president Amit Shah to put up a demand that former chief minister Yeddyurappa be made the state party president.
It was an embarrassment for the party since the tenure of current incumbent Pralhad Joshi is still valid for almost an year. The Modi-Shah duo did not take it kindly. Kore was issued a notice by the party for his indiscretion.
Kore was at a programme organized by the Angadi Institute of Technology, headed by another BJP MP Suresh Angadi, here on Friday. On the sidelines, he was accosted by mediapersons, who shot some leading questions at him, specially in the backdrop of his recent appeal to the party higher-ups.
He had to answer a wide range of questions, including the one about demands for a separate north Karnataka state. It was pointed out to him that the northern part of Karnataka had faced regional imbalance and he was asked what his stand in the matter was in case a separate state was carved out.
Kore said that there was no question of splitting the state. The people of the northern region might have dreamt of a separate state, but he wondered how it was possible for them to sit by themselves and decide about the division. While saying that the time was not ripe enough for such a development, he also cautioned that developmental imbalances should be taken care of, failing which they could lead to situations like the case of Andhra Pradesh which got split for the same reason.
He took the opportunity to reveal his ambition to become the chief minister of the state, but in its undivided status. Stressing that the Belagavi district had always suffered injustice in many ways, he could not set a time-frame to set it right. Political unity was most important and it was only through it that political and developmental representation could be achieved, he further said.
MP Suresh Angadi said that he would try to convince the Union government’s team which is likely to visit the state to identify and choose the ideal location for an IIT to consider Belagavi as the suitable site.