# Karnataka minister calls RSS thousand-headed venomous snake 2026-08-17T06:51:24+00:00 | Governance | Indian Opinion Desk Corroboration: 2 independent outlets Karnataka Minister Yathindra Siddaramaiah on Monday described the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) as a "thousand-headed venomous snake" filled with casteism, communalism and Manuvad. He demanded a public apology from the RSS, BJP and Sri Ram Sena to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge over an alleged purification ritual at a rally venue in Haldwani, Uttarakhand. Addressing Congress workers, Siddaramaiah said the RSS spreads poison of casteism and Manusmriti ideology and must be condemned. The row erupted after Sri Ram Sena performed a havan at the Ramlila Maidan stage on August 10, two days after Kharge's rally. Congress leaders called it a discriminatory act against Dalits. Separately, Karnataka home minister Priyank Kharge questioned the RSS's legal status and accountability on social media, asking under which law it functions. He said existence is not the issue but transparency is, and challenged BJP general secretary B L Santhosh to clarify its legal identity. ## Coverage - timesofindia.indiatimes.com - deccanherald.com This story was synthesised by AI from the 2 sources linked above. Updated: this story now draws on 2 sources. Last updated 2026-08-17T17:01:56+00:00. Tags: BJP, Mallikarjun Kharge, Priyank Kharge, RSS, Sri Ram Sena, Yathindra Siddaramaiah Canonical: https://indianopinion.org/karnataka-minister-calls-rss-thousand-headed-venomous-snake/ License: Summary and commentary (c) Indian Opinion, reusable with attribution. Facts belong to the linked sources. Cite: https://indianopinion.org/karnataka-minister-calls-rss-thousand-headed-venomous-snake/#story-in-brief How this brief was made: an AI model read the reports linked above and wrote this summary and analysis, which were published automatically. Published briefs are sampled every hour by an automated quality check; the editor verifies its findings and approves corrections, and corrected briefs carry a dated correction line. Stance labels are editorial classifications of how each outlet framed this story, assigned by the same model, not ratings of the outlets. We do no original reporting. Methodology: https://indianopinion.org/ai-use-policy/