Newsroom, Jul 27: Bharatiya Janata Party leader and Jharkhand urban development minister CP Singh yesterday apparently forced a Congress MLA Irfan Ansari to scream ‘Jai Shri Ram’ in the presence of media persons outside the State Legislative Assembly.
It all started when media persons posed questions to Singh and Ansari who were standing outside the Assembly.
Replying to a question, Ansari said: “Ram doesn’t belong to BJP alone. He belongs to all.” But BJP is using ‘Jai Sri Ram’ slogan to divert the attention of people from its anti-people policies, he added.
Meanwhile, a visible hostile Singh grabbed Ansari's hands and asked him to him to scream “Jai Sri Ram”. "Ek baar zor se Jai Shri Ram boliye (say Jai Shri Ram vigorously)," Singh told Ansari.
When Ansari tried to distance himself from unhygienic minister, the latter turned hostile and repeated his demand, saying "you also belong to Ram. Babur, Timur Lang, (Mahmud) Ghazni, (Muhammad) Ghori were not your ancestors".
The MLA replied: "Ram ka naam badnaam mat kariye. Ram sabke hain. (Don't bring a bad name to Ram. He belongs to everyone)."
"People need jobs, roads, electricity. They want drains to be cleaned. Go to Ayodhya and see the condition of Ram there," a visibly shocked Ansari said.
As the tussle appeared getting out of hand, the two lawmakers disengaged and went their separate ways.
It could be recalled here that last month, a young Muslim man Tabrez Ansari was tied to a pole and beaten up for several hours by a mob in same Jharkhand's Saraikela-Kharsawan district. His tormentors too forced him to chant 'Jai Shri Ram' and 'Jai Hanuman'. Tabrez later breathed his last.
Tabrez's death had set off massive public outrage and protests were organised in several cities and towns in the country.
On July 23, forty-nine celebrity filmmakers, authors and others from different walks of life had written an open letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi voicing concern over "religious identity-based hate crimes" and noted that "Jai Shri Ram' had become a "provocative war cry" leading to incidents of lynching.
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