HDK's Superstitious Brother Revanna is at it Again, Fixes 'Auspicious' Time for Budget Announcement

Bengaluru: Karnataka Public Works Department Minister HD Revanna, known to be a staunch believer in Hindu ritualistic practices and astrology, is in the news again, this time for fixing the ‘auspicious time’ for delivering the Karnataka budget. Karnataka Chief minister HD Kumaraswamy will be presenting his second budget on Friday.

To ward off ‘bad time’ Revanna, who is also Kumaraswamy’s brother, has told him to present the budget only after 12.35 pm, as according to him, the time period from 11.07 am till 12.33 pm is ‘rahu kaal’, a bad period as per the astrology.

Revanna has reportedly warned Kumaraswamy that if he presents the budget during the said ‘rahu kaal’, it will not bring good luck to the government and to his post. Like every time, Kumaraswamy has taken note of his brother’s advice and fixed the time to 12.35 pm.

Politicians going a little overboard with their superstitions is not a new phenomenon in India. During the recent lunar eclipse, leaders from all political parties in Karnataka had skipped work citing “negative vibes” from the eclipse.

But the Gowda family is seemingly a lot more superstitious than any other political party in the state.

There was a time when Revanna travelled between Bengaluru and Holenarasipura, his assembly constituency in Hassan — a round trip of 350km — almost every day, as astrology guru had advised him against sleeping in his own house in Bengaluru as long as he is a minister.

The astrologer had reportedly even told him that failure to do so would lead to collapse of the JDS-Congress coalition government. Revanna continued with this practice over six months till he ‘warded off the evil’ through a special puja.

His unshakable belief in astrology was evident once again when he chose to take the oath of office on June 6 at exactly 2.12 pm. He was supposed to take oath after RV Deshpande, who is the senior most minister, but Revanna broke the rule and took the oath first.

Revanna even schedules Kumaraswamy's important meetings as per ‘auspicious’ astrological time and also renovated HDK’s official residence 'Anugraha' as per vastu directives when the latter had become chief minister for the first time in 2006. However, Kumaraswamy government did not last long. It was a 20-20 coalition government with the BJP.