Opposition slams BJP leader Tarun Vijay for his 'black people' remark

NEW DELHI: The Lok Sabha was adjourned for a short while on Monday following noisy protests by Congressled Opposition benches over BJP leader Tarun Vijay’s comment about ‘black people from South India’.

While the Opposition demanded action against Vijay and threatened agitation on the streets, home minister Rajnath Singh intervened to assert that there will be no discrimination of Indians based on caste, colour or creed.

However, Singh’s refusal to condemn the remarks, by pointing out that Vijay had apologised for it, led to the Opposition’s vociferous protest that forced the Chair to adjourn the House briefly. Raising the issue during the zero hour, Congress f loor leader Mallikarjun Kharge said that Vijay’s comments had exposed the “mind-set of BJP” and asked the government whether such comments were meant to provoke people from South Indian states to demand independence from India.


“Are people living in South India part of the country or not? This shows your mentality. Do you want to divide India,” an agitated Kharge asked, with Sonia Gandhi and her party MPs backing him. He asked whether Vijay and the BJP were unaware that in all parts of India there were many sections of people with dark complexion.

Vijay, a former BJP MP, had walked into a political minefield during a TV programme recently while trying to say that the attack on Africans in the national capital region was not racist. “If we were racist, why would we have the entire South... Why do we live with them if we are racist? We have black people around us,” he had asked, while trying to elaborate.