Mysuru: The tourists’ inflow to the cultural city has dropped by 70 per cent following the Cauvery agitation after September 6, and has further dropped to 75 per cent, according to Mysuru Travel agents association head C.A. Jayakumar.
‘Palace On Wheels’ was launched on Sunday with 38 people taking the privilege to see eight palaces with lunch at Lalitmahal during the Dasara festivities. It is said that almost 20 of them were Mysureans.
The Cauvery conflict has led to a silent Dasara which otherwise would be seen as a very grand affair. There are no political bigwigs inaugurating the events of the Dasara festivities. Local ministers and MLAs including district minister Dr H.C. Mahadevappa, Minister H.S. Mahadev Prasad, Education Minister Tanveer Sait, MLAs M.K. Somshekar, Vasu and others are doing the honours by inaugurating and managing the events. Chief Minister Siddaramaiah had to rush to attend an all-party meeting after joining the inauguration ceremony atop Chamundi Hills.
Ministers who were supposed to inaugurate various programmes such as Police help desks (Dr G Parameswar), Film festival (R.V. Deshpande), Food mela (Mr U.T. Khader, Exhibition (Priyank Kharge and Ramesh Jarkiholi), Dasara illumination ( D.K. Shivkumar) did not turn up too.
Minister for Kannada and Culture Umashree did not turn up for the inaugural event and gave a miss to the ‘Caring and Sharing’ programme held as part of Senior Citizens Day, Women’s Dasara and Dasara cultural programmes too. On Sunday Minister H. Anjaneya gave a miss to inauguration of Yoga Dasara and Ramalinga Reddy missed the launch of Palace on Wheels.
Only Minister Pramod Madvaraj participated in the inaugural of the Dasara sports and half marathon on Sunday.
