Thakur’s unchecked vitriol has also drawn the attention of the Election Commission.
Is the BJP, in effect, saying that it won’t act against its loose-tongued members until the furore they kick up goes international? The party should recognise that Thakur is no longer a symbol it can wield – she is a burden that is weighing it down.
By: Editorial
December 28, 2022 06:20 IST
The comments made by Pragya Singh Thakur, BJP MP from Bhopal, in Shivamogga, Karnataka, on the need for Hindus to keep their knives sharp, are no aberration. Thakur has done this before — and she’s got away with it. She has spoken in ways that could be seen as inflammatory, and were certainly unseemly, she has retracted her remarks, her party has distanced itself from them, rinse and repeat. At Shivamogga, apart from exhorting the Hindu community to take up arms, she held forth on the spectre of “love jihad” that haunts their daughters. Earlier, after her candidature was declared from the Bhopal seat for the 2019 Lok Sabha election, she bragged that Hemant Karkare, Maharashtra ATS chief who was killed in the 26/11 attack, died because of her “curse” — Karkare was leading the probe in the 2008 Malegaon blasts case in which Thakur is an accused. She kicked up a national furore when she described Mahatma Gandhi’s assassin, Nathuram Godse, as a “desh bhakt”. This time, as in the case of her comments on Karkare, the BJP distanced itself from her, but also did more than that. Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed anguish: “It’s a different matter that she has apologised, I will not be able to forgive her from my heart”. And Amit Shah, then party chief, spoke of disciplinary action. Yet, except her removal from a parliamentary committee, for Thakur, there have been no real penalties to pay.
© The Indian Express (P) Ltd