'Foot in Mouth Disease' Hits BJP Again

NEW DELHI: “Ab ki baar, bache char” is a clever slogan coined by the Congress party in response to BJP MP Sakshi Maharaj’s call for each Hindu family to produce at least four children.

Widespread reaction in the form of criticism and jokes had the BJP distancing itself from the remarks by claiming to have issued a show cause notice to its MP who had earlier generated controversy with other remarks such as describing the assassin of Gandhi, Nathuram Godse as a “patriot.”

Congress spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi drove point home asking whether the above will be the new slogan of the BJP. He wondered over Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s silence on this, saying he should at least tweet his views.

Sakshi Maharaj remained defiant and told the media in Delhi that he had no idea about the show cause notice. "I have not received any notice. If I receive a notice I shall reply to it," he said.

"I have just come to Delhi. If a notice was sent, my office would have received it. It is a "ghar ka mamala" (internal matter). Why is the media intruding?" he wanted to know.

The BJP claimed that this was the personal opinion of the MP. Party spokesperson Shrikant Sharma urged the workers to “promote the good work done by the government and refrain from getting involved in unnecessary statements.”

But the MP from Uttar Pradesh remained unfazed merely saying, "Raat gayi, baat gayi (The night has passed, so has the issue at hand).

PM Modi has maintained a studied silence over the series of remarks by his legislators that have attracted Opposition criticism and derision on the social media. The media has been informed a couple of times in briefings that the PM was not happy with these controversial statements and had urged the BJP MPs and leaders not to speak out of turn. He had told them that he would not tolerate it, according to the source based reports. However, despite being active on the social media PM Modi has taken care not to speak on these issues and has maintained a stoic silence.

In fact Parliament was stalled for almost the entire winter session following the Opposition demand that the PM break his silence over the conversion ‘ghar wapsi’ issue and assure the House that action will be taken by his government against all those BJP/RSS and their affiliate groups members for violating the tenets of the Indian Constitution with communal remarks and hate speech. PM Modi did not give this assurance leading to continuous disruptions in the Rajya Sabha in particular.