Bhopal, Oct 28: Madhya Pradesh Congress leaders on Wednesday hit out at the ruling BJP for nominating Union minister Hardeep Singh Puri for the Rajya Sabha election from the state despite the controversy over his alleged links with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Speaking in Bhopal, Leader of Opposition in the Assembly Umang Singhar said the BJP, which talks about women’s safety and the pro-women Ladli Behna scheme, should clarify why it nominated Puri.
He also asked whether the saffron party could not find a capable Dalit, tribal or Other Backward Classes candidate from Madhya Pradesh.
The BJP’s politics clearly showed that it saw the state as a laboratory for political experiments, the Congress leader claimed.
“To cultivate its own political equations while ignoring the interests and dignity of the people of the state has become the BJP’s modus operandi. We will not allow Madhya Pradesh to become a laboratory for the BJP,” Singhar said.
State Congress President Jitu Patwari said the BJP must explain when the country will receive answers to the questions regarding the Epstein scandal, and accused it of insulting the people of Madhya Pradesh.
Former Union minister Arun Yadav said that Madhya Pradesh already ranked number one in the country in cases of child abuse, and “sending a friend of an ‘international child abuser’ to the Rajya Sabha tarnishes the state’s image.”
The decision exposed the BJP’s attitude towards women and girls, he said.
Puri, 74, currently serves as the Union minister of petroleum and natural gas. His term as Rajya Sabha member from Uttar Pradesh is set to be over on November 25.
The Rajya Sabha bypoll in Madhya Pradesh to fill the vacancy created by the resignation of former Union minister L Murugan will take place on November 12.
The Congress has been demanding Puri’s resignation on grounds that his name figures in the “Epstein files” released in the US.
Puri has denied the charges levelled against him by the opposition party.
