Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, July 24: Losing his cool in the face of loud protests from the opposition benches in the state Assembly, the Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar on Wednesday made some uncharitable remarks against women which his critics interpreted it as his saying that women don’t understand anything.
Targeting a woman member from the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) Rekha Paswan, Mr Kumar shouted, “You are a woman, don’t you know anything?” The remark prompted a strong response from senior RJD leader and former deputy chief minister Tejashwi Yadav, who accused Mr Kumar of being a habitual offender when it came to comments against women.
During the Assembly session, Mr Kumar found his government and himself under attack from opposition MLAs, particularly from the RJD and the Congress, with whom he was in an alliance until the beginning of this year. Raising slogans like ‘Nitish Kumar Hai‘ (Down with Nitish Kumar), the opposition parties attacked Mr Kumar for his government’s “failures” on reservation and special status for Bihar.
Last month, the Patna High Court had struck down the Bihar government’s move to increase the reservation cap in government jobs and educational institutions to 65%. Mr Kumar’s government faced another setback this week when the Union government, of which the chief minister’s party, the Janata Dal United (JDU), is also a part, said “no case was made out” to give special status to Bihar.
In the Assembly, Mr Kumar said the government has taken steps to challenge the Patna High Court’s decision in the Supreme Court, but that failed to pacify the opposition.
As the protests continued during the chief minister’s speech, an increasingly angry Mr Kumar launched into a tirade, saying, “Arre mahila ho, kuch jaanti nahin ho? Arre bol rahi hai, kahan se aate? Yeh logo ne kabhi mahila ko aage badhaya tha? Bol rahi ho? Faltu. Isliye ham keh rahe hai, chup chaap suno. Arre kya hua? Sunoge nahin? Hum to sunayenge. Agar aap nahin suniyega, to aap logo ki galti hai.” (You are a woman, don’t you know anything? Look, she is talking. Why do you talk so much nonsense? Have you [the opposition] done anything for women? We will talk and if you don’t listen, it’s your [the opposition’s] fault.)
Perturbed by the slogans being raised against him, he hit back saying, “sabka hai! hai!” As the opposition erupted and the slogan-shouting got louder, Mr Kumar carried on with his speech, insisting that his government has done a lot for the disadvantaged sections of society.
Reacting to the chief minister’s remarks, Tejashwi Yadav posted in Hindi on X, “‘You are a woman, do you know anything?’ Making cheap, unwanted, uncivilised, rude and low-level comments against women has become a habit of Honourable Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. This is a very serious and worrying issue for the state.”
“A few days ago, the chief minister had made a lewd comment on the beauty of a BJP woman MLA from the tribal class. Today, he made a comment on two-time Scheduled Caste woman MLA Rekha Paswan. Honourable Shri Nitish ji has become the greatest knower, meditator, interpreter and creator of the universe. Apart from him, no one knows anything,” the RJD leader added.
This is not the first time Mr Kumar has sparked a controversy with his speeches in the Bihar Assembly. In November last year, he had said women should be educated as it would enable them to avoid sexual intercourse from resulting in pregnancy. After a furore from leaders of the BJP, which was in the opposition in Bihar at the time, Mr Kumar had apologised and said he was taking back his words.