Bhopal, Mar 23 (PTI) Karni Sena members on Sunday protested outside the Madhya Pradesh office of the Samajwadi Party here to object to MP Ramji Lal Suman’s remark on Rajput warrior Rana Sanga.
The right-wing outfit's state unit also announced a reward of Rs 5 lakh to the person who will blacken Suman's face and hit him with shoes.
The state unit of the Akhilesh Yadav-headed SP alleged that the protesters damaged the party’s banners and posters outside the office, which is housed in a government quarter in the Tulsi Nagar locality of Bhopal.
Speaking in the Rajya Sabha on March 21, Suman had called Mewar ruler Rana Sanga a “traitor” and said that Hindus are his descendants.
TT Nagar police station in-charge Sudhir Arjaria told PTI that Karni Sena members burnt an effigy during the protest outside the SP office, he said.
Asked about the SP’s allegations about damage to its banners and posters, Arjaria said no such incident happened.
No case has been registered as it was a brief protest, he said.
SP’s national spokesman Yash Bharatiya told PTI that the protesters attacked the office around 7.15 pm. It was done on behalf of the ruling BJP and it shows the failure of the state government, he claimed.
Bharatiya said that police were present before the arrival of the protesters which proves that they had prior knowledge of the demonstration.
He also shared a video showing a purported protester removing the banner put up outside the SP office. This is arrogance of power and the issue should be discussed in the assembly, he said.
During the protest, the members of the right-wing outfit raised slogans against the SP chief Akhilesh Yadav.
Karni Sena has also vowed to "punish" Suman for making indecent remarks against the Rajput warrior “who never faced defeat in his life”.
The outfit’s state chief Shiv Pratap Singh Chouhan said, “Sanga, who kept fighting with the Mughals, sustained 83 injuries on his body and lost one eye, a leg and a hand.”
“I urge the youths from the Rajput community to blacken Suman’s face and hit him with shoes wherever they find him. Such a person will be rewarded Rs 5 lakh,” he said.
Samajwadi Party leader Suman sparked a controversy in the Rajya Sabha on March 21 by calling Rana Sanga a “traitor” and saying that Hindus are his descendants.
Rana Sanga, or Sangram Singh I, was the ruler of Mewar from 1508 to 1528.
Suman, referring to the term ‘Babur ki aulad’, said that Muslims in India do not idolise the Mughal emperor. “They consider Mohammed Sahab and Sufi saints’ traditions as their ideals,” he said.
Claiming that Rana Sanga called Babur to defeat Ibrahim Lodi, Suman said, “If Muslims are ‘Babur ki aulad’ (Babur's descendants), then you are the descendants of traitor Rana Sanga, this should be clear.”