Mysuru: A breakfast arranged for the families of Dasara mahouts and kavadis turned into an embarrassing episode on Monday after district minister Yathindra Siddaramaiah arrived more than an hour late, prompting senior Congress MLA Tanveer Sait to leave the venue expressing his displeasure.Sait, a former minister, was angry that mahouts and kavadis were made to wait for their breakfast. In his defence, Yathindra reasoned that as he had moved to a new house with no workers, and he could not get out of the house with things scattered.The district administration had organised the breakfast at Mysuru Palace premises at 9am for the mahouts, kavadis and their families associated with the Dasara elephant contingent. However, the minister arrived around 10.15am, leaving the guests waiting for over an hour.Sait, who had waited at the venue for nearly forty-five minutes, expressed his displeasure over the delay during a phone conversation with DC Lakshmikanth Reddy, who is also the special officer for Dasara. Questioning the minister’s lack of punctuality, Sait said there should be a limit to how long people could be made to wait, particularly the mahouts and their families who had assembled specially for the Naada Habba. “There is a limit for everything. Other things can be tolerated, but making the mahouts wait for food is not acceptable… I am leaving from here,” Sait told the DC before leaving the venue.The incident occurred at the beginning of Dasara preparations and drew attention as the programme was specifically organised to honour and host the families taking care of the elephants, who play a key role in the annual festivities.Speaking to TOI, a couple of mahouts and kavadis, including their family members, said, “We usually have breakfast between 8.30am and 9am, but on Monday, though we came for the special breakfast at 8.45am itself, we were forced to wait till 10.45am, which is really unfortunate.” We have never waited for such a long time at Mysuru Palace. Instead of waiting for the minister to come, they should have given us breakfast on time and the minister could have joined us later, they added.Later, Yathindra Siddaramaiah explained the reason for his delay, and said that he had recently moved into a new house where household items were still scattered, and added that, with his mother away and no workers available, he lost time arranging things before leaving for the event. The minister said the delay was not intentional and added that he had spoken to Sait over a call regarding the issue.
