The Karnataka government has decided to provide protection to over 15 writers and academicians who have been receiving threats, PTI reported on Thursday.

Karnataka Home Minister G Parameshwara said that directions have been issued to Director General of Police Alok Mohan and Bengaluru Police Commissioner B Dayananda to provide security to the writers and intellectuals.

The letters began arriving to the writers after 61 of them wrote an open letter in May last year to Bharatiya Janata Party leader Basavaraj Bommai, who was then the Karnataka chief minister, expressing their concerns about “rising intolerance” in the state, reported The Hindu. At the time, protests had been taking place against the ban on hijab by the state government and other religious clothing in educational institutes.

Among those who have sought security from the Karnataka government are writers SG Siddaramaiah, Vasundhara Bhoopathi, Kum Veerabhadrappa, Professors Marulasiddappa and Banajagere Jayaprakash, reported The New Indian Express.

In the letter, the writers are warned that “they will meet the fate of activists MM Kalburgi and Gauri Lankesh,” according to PTI.

Kalburgi, a Kendriya Sahitya Akademi awardee and anti-superstition activist, was shot dead at his home in Dharwad district in Karnataka on August 30, 2015. Lankesh, a journalist known for her strident views against Hindutva politics, was killed at her home in Bengaluru by gunmen on September 5, 2017.

The chargesheets for both the murder cases list the same six individuals as suspects. However, the Kalburgi case chargesheet says these men are from an unnamed organisation but the one filed in the murder of Lankesh says they were named as members of Hindutva body Sanathan Sanstha.

Bhupathi had filed a complaint with the police, stating that she received a letter warning her not to associate herself with writers such as Siddaramaiah and Ramachandrappa, who had both opposed “saffronisation” of school textbooks by the former BJP government.

Veerabhadrappa had said he received a letter accusing him of being “anti-Hindu” and to “be ready for his funeral”.

On Friday, Parameshwara said the state government takes the matter seriously.

“We have not forgotten the killing of Gauri Lankesh and Professor Kalburgi,” he said, reported The New Indian Express. “I have directed police officers to give protection to writers. We will get all details from the writers during the meeting on Saturday.”

Jayaprakash told The New Indian Express that he has received 13 such letters since June 2022.

“We get such letters whenever we give statements against the government on matters such as revision of textbooks,” Jayaprakash said. “The letters were posted from different parts of the state. The previous BJP [Bharatiya Janata Party] government constituted a vigilance team. Even now, we are getting such letters. We will discuss the matter with the home minister.”

The police had arrested a man identified as Pradeeep from Harihara of Davangere district in May in connection with the case but the writers continued to receive the letters.

Some of the letters sent since then have appealed to the police to release Pradeep. “The letters that I have received after the arrest of the alleged letter writer are also in the same handwriting as the previous ones,” Jayaprakash told The Hindu. “In a letter I received on July 22, the writer has made an appeal to the police to release Pradeep, arrested from Harihara in connection with the case.”