New Delhi: Hemant Soren-led Jharkhand government has allocated a separate room in the state assembly for reading Namaz, sparking off a major controversy.
The state government, in a directive, issued on Sept 2, says that room number TW 348 in the new Assembly building of Jharkhand, has been allocated for offering Namaz.
The notification by state govt has triggered series of reactions, with BJP and rival parties are accusing it of practising ‘appeasement politics’.
Appeasement ke ‘Kaam Ki Baat’!
The @HemantSorenJMM govt in Jharkhand is building a special ‘Namaz Room’ inside the new State Assembly.
Secularism Fact Check: Only 4 out of 81 MLAs in the state are Muslims.#Jharkhand pic.twitter.com/gE2nDlJas1
— Know The Nation (@knowthenation) September 4, 2021
Expressing strong reservations over controversial decision, the BJP has demanded that a separate room should be allotted for Hindu legislators so that they could recite Hanuman Chalisa.
BJP leader and former Speaker CP Singh demanded that a temple should also be built at the Assembly premises.
“I’m not against Namaz room but then they should also build a temple at Jharkhand Vidhan Sabha premises. I even demand that Hanuman Temple should be set up there. If Speaker approves we can build the temple at our own cost,” he told newsmen.
Jharkhand Assembly inaugurated in 2019 by PM Modi
The new building of Jharkhand Assembly was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated in 2019. The three-storey building, constructed at a cost of Rs 465 crore, is among the first paperless Assembly in the country.
Not the first instance of appeasement politics
Last month, the state government triggered huge row over dropping Hindi and Sanskrit from list of compulsory languages while retained Urdu along with other languages was retained. This meant that any candidate appearing in any examination for state government job could appear in 12 languages in regional & tribal languages and Urdu but Hindi and Sanskrit didn’t form part of the official language in which they could appear.
BJP slammed the discriminatory employment policy of Jharkhand govt, asserting that it was meant to appease a particular community for political gains.
