Gurugram: A Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator from Haryana raked up the horrors of the partition by claiming that the killings of Hindus in Pakistan “stopped only after the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) slaughtered a trainload of Muslims” only to do a volte-face later.
Two-time Jind MLA Krishan Lal Middha made the remarks at an event held to mark ‘Partition Horrors Remembrance Day’ at Fatehabad. The event was organised by the Haryana government and had Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar as its chief guest.
Middha, who traces his roots to the Punjab province in Pakistan, said at the event: “When the country witnessed partition, our forefathers faced a tough time migrating from that part (now in Pakistan) to this part (India) of the country. Many of them were killed on board trains”.
Before they fled, many buried their valuables in their homes in Pakistan thinking they would retrieve it when they returned, he claimed.
“Many people noticed while boarding trains that people from the Muslim community raping Hindu women. It sends shivers down our spines to even think of how some of our buzurg (the elderly) poisoned their women by mixing poison in the rotis (bread) to save their ijjat (pride),” he further said. “Somehow they arrived in India by saving themselves from the Muslims. It was only when the RSS people slaughtered a trainload of Muslims and sent it to Pakistan that the Muslims stopped killing Hindus.”
When asked about the remarks at a media briefing, Khattar, who had not been present during the MLA’s speech, refused to comment, saying Middha alone “could answer for what he said”.
When contacted, Middha told ThePrint appeared to be backpedaling, claiming that he didn’t belong to a generation that witnessed the partition and that he was merely relaying what he had seen in ‘Gadar’, a movie starring actor Gurdaspur MP Sunny Deol and Ameesha Patel.
Partition Horrors Remembrance Day is observed on 14 August each year to commemorate the victims of India’s partition and was first observed in 2021. Although figures vary widely, between 5,00,000 and 10,00,000 people are believed to have died and millions more displaced at that time.
Middha’s past controversy — comparing officials with terrorists
Krishan Middha is the son of Indian National Lok Dal Leader Hari Chand Middha, himself a two-time MLA from Jind. Middha joined the BJP in November 2018 — two months after his father’s death — and was fielded from Jind in a by-election in January 2019 and then again months later in October 2019.
According to an affidavit he filed before the Election Commission during the 2019 election, Middha secured a B.A.M.S. degree from Kameshwar Singh Sanskrit University Darbhanga (Bihar) in 1996.
This isn’t the first time Middha made such controversial remarks. In September 2021, Middha found himself in the middle of a blazing row when he compared “terrorists” with local administrative officers, claiming that the former were better because they “ at least took responsibility for their attacks”, according to media reports. He made the remarks while inspecting roads in Jind town, which had caved in within months of their construction.
(Edited by Uttara Ramaswamy)
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