New low in poll rhetoric: Yogi’s ‘Ram naam satya’ to Scindia’s ‘kutta hoon’

Election rhetoric hit a new low in bypoll-bound Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh with prominent BJP and Congress campaigners resorting to threats of ‘ram naam satya hai’ (a chant used for the dead) and crass metaphors to target one another.

Raking up his party’s pet issue of ‘love jihad’ at an election rally in Malhani (Jaunpur) in Uttar Pradesh on Saturday (October 31), Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said those playing with Hindu women should be prepared for their last rites.

“Chori chhupe naam chhupa kar ke jo log behen betiyon ki izzat ke saath khilwad karte hain, unko pehle se meri chetawni; agar wo sudhre nahi toh Ram naam satya hai ki yatra nikalne waali hai (Consider this my warning to those who hide their names and play with the honour of our sisters and daughters. If they don’t mend their ways, they would soon see their last rites happening),” he said.

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The Uttar Pradesh chief minister also quoted a recent ruling of the Allahabad High Court which said that religious conversion is not mandatory for marriage.

In Madhya Pradesh, BJP leader Jyotiraditya Scindia compared himself to a ‘dog’ in a alleged rebuttal to an earlier dig by former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Kamal Nath.

“Kamal Nath ji came here to Ashoknagar and called me a dog. Yes, Kamal Nath ji, I am a dog. Because the public is my master. Yes, I am a dog, because a dog protects its master,” Scindia said while addressing a rally in Bhopal on Saturday.

The Congress rubbished the allegations, but in another rally Congress leader Acharya Pramod used the same metaphor in an indirect dig at Scindia.

“When Kamal Nathji was trying to act against a mafia don here, someone protected him like a faithful dog,” he said while not naming Scindia.

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Byelections are slated to be held for 28 seats in the Madhya Pradesh Assembly on November 3.

Earlier in the day, the Election Commission had revoked the ‘star campaigner’ status of Kamal Nath over his remarks at a female BJP leader, whom he had called an ‘item’.