‘Counter to DMK ideal’: Tejashwi slams Maran for ‘cleaning toilets’ remark

Bihar Deputy CM Tejashwi Yadav on Sunday (December 24) strongly denounced DMK MP Dayanidhi Maran's reported statement about people from the Hindi heartland engaging in menial jobs like cleaning toilets in Tamil Nadu.

Yadav said like his RJD, the DMK headed by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin was a party that believed in social justice and it was unbecoming of a leader of such a party to have made such a remark.

"Had the DMK MP highlighted caste iniquities, had he pointed out that only people from some social groups took up such hazardous jobs, it would have made sense", said the RJD leader.

"But to speak disparagingly of the entire populace of Bihar and UP is reprehensible. We condemn it. We believe that people should be respectful towards those coming from other parts of the country", asserted Yadav.

"We look upon DMK as a party which shares our ideal of social justice. Its leaders should avoid saying things that run counter to the ideal", said Yadav, who is known to share personal equations with Stalin.

A row has been triggered over Maran's recent speech, in Tamil, in which the former Union minister had stressed on the importance of English education.

Maran had claimed that those who acquired proficiency in English got respectable jobs in the IT sector unlike residents of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, who knew only Hindi and ended up migrating to richer states like Tamil Nadu for "cleaning toilets and roads and working as construction labour".

The ruling Mahagathbandhan in Bihar, of which RJD is the largest constituent, and the DMK-helmed Secular Progressive Alliance, are now part of the INDIA coalition.

(With agency inputs)