Bhaiya controversy like Black issue in US: Congress leader Manish Tewari
New Delhi, Feb 18: Days after Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi kicked up a controversy with his "bhaiya" remark, his Congress party colleague Manish Tewari on Friday said it is reflective of a social bias against migrants and likened it to the issue of Black Americans.
Such thinking should have no place in the secular ethos of Punjab and has to be rooted out, said Tewari, a former union minister and a part of the group of 23 Congress leaders who had called for organisational reforms and was critical of the party leadership.
With party leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra by his side during an election roadshow in Rupnagar on Tuesday, Channi had asked people not to let the bhaiyas from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Delhi enter the state.
The remark was apparently aimed at Aam Aadmi Party leaders, but bhaiya is considered a derogatory term for migrants from UP and Bihar who work in Punjab.
Ahead of the February 20 assembly polls, Tewari tweeted, "De-Horse Politics - The Bhaiya controversy is like the Black issue in the US. It is reflective of an unfortunate systemic and institutionalised social bias against migrants stretching back to the inception of the Green Revolution."
At a personal level, he said, "despite my mother being a Jat Sikh and my father being the foremost exponent of Punjab-Punjabi-Punjabiyat who laid down his life for Hindu-Sikh amity because of my surname it is said behind my back 'Eh Bhaiya Kithon Agha' peppered with the choicest expletives in Punjabi - We have to root it out."
"Such thinking should have no place in the secular ethos of Punjab grounded in the idiom 'Manas Ki Jaat Sabhe Ek Pechan'," Tewari said.
The BJP and the AAP have flayed Channi for his remarks.
The Punjab chief minister said his comment was directed at a few individuals causing disruption in the state and that it has been twisted.
"My statement is being twisted since yesterday. The migrants have taken Punjab to the path of development with their hard work. They have always contributed towards development, he said in a video message on Twitter on Thursday.
Our love for them is in our heart and nobody can take it out, he added.
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Congress using hijab issue to pacify minority anger, alleges Karnataka LoP R Ashoka
Bengaluru: Leader of Opposition in the Assembly R. Ashoka has accused the Congress government of using the hijab issue to placate what he described as discontent among minority voters after the Davanagere by-election.
In a post on X on Wednesday, Ashoka alleged that the state government, instead of addressing issues such as price rise, corruption, farmers’ distress and law and order, was attempting to retain its minority vote base by reviving the hijab issue.
Referring to the 2022 dress code introduced by the BJP government, which prohibited hijab in schools and colleges, Ashoka said the Karnataka High Court had upheld the policy and emphasised the importance of discipline in educational institutions.
He questioned the Congress government’s move to revisit the issue and asked whether setting aside the court-backed policy to benefit one community could be described as secularism.
Ashoka further alleged that while the government was willing to permit hijab, it continued to prohibit saffron shawls.
He accused the government of dividing students on religious lines rather than treating schools and colleges as spaces of equality.
Drawing a comparison with Mamata Banerjee’s government in West Bengal, Ashoka claimed that excessive appeasement politics had harmed the state and warned that the Congress in Karnataka could face a similar political response.
He said voters in Karnataka would teach the Congress a lesson for what he termed “vote-bank politics” and for compromising constitutional and judicial principles.
