New Delhi: “Baahubali (strongman)”, “pehelwanjee”, “local don” and “man with huge political strength and goodwill” in parts of Uttar Pradesh — is how Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders describe party MP and former Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) president, Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, 66, who stands accused of sexual harassment by India’s top wrestlers.
While a group of wrestlers are currently sitting on an indefinite protest at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi demanding Singh’s arrest, the BJP-led Modi government at the Centre is in a quandary over what to do with him, party leaders admitted to ThePrint.
A six-time Lok Sabha MP from Gonda, Kaiserganj and Balrampur constituencies in UP — he currently represents Kaiserganj in the Lok Sabha — Singh is believed to hold sway in five Lok Sabha constituencies of the state and is said to be indispensable to the BJP ahead of the 2024 general elections.
BJP leaders ThePrint spoke to cited Singh’s clout, muscle power, a chain of educational institutes in UP and links to BJP’s ideological parent, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), and Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), as weighing in his favour.
On the other hand, are the charges against him by World Championships medal winner Vinesh Phogat and Olympic medallists Bajrang Punia and Sakshi Malik, who have branded him a “predator” and accused him of aiding “sexual assault” of female wrestlers.
A local BJP leader from UP’s Gonda told ThePrint: “Pehelwanjee dictates politics and ticket distribution in the five Lok Sabha constituencies of Gonda, Bahraich, Domariyaganj, Kaiserganj and Shravasti. He does not need anyone to win elections, every party is ready to give him a ticket and it is Brij Bhushan who obliges them.”
The BJP currently holds four of these five seats, while Shravasti is with the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).
Despite the leader’s clout, some in the party fear the controversy surrounding him could act against the party’s interests.
Speaking to ThePrint, a second senior BJP leader from Delhi said “time is running out for the party to take action against Singh” and the “protesting wrestlers can damage the political narrative of our government in election time”.
The leader added: “Despite Singh’s political strength, the narrative is not going in the BJP’s favour. On the one hand we say ‘beti bachao’ and ‘beti padho’, and on the other are these charges. What message will we send to the youth if action is not taken?”
ThePrint reached UP BJP spokesperson Rakesh Tripathi on phone for comment on the protest against Singh, but he declined comment.
Singh, who was also part of the Samajwadi Party (SP) for a while, denied the harassment charges when they were first levelled in January this year, terming them politically motivated and accusing the protestors of being Congress pawns. He has since appeared defiant in the face of further allegations.
On Thursday, he put out a video message on social media stating: “Friends, the day I reflect on my life, what I gained or lost, the day I feel I don’t have the strength to fight, the day I feel helpless, I won’t like to live a life like that. Instead of living such a life, I would wish that death embraced me.”
‘That day I can be hanged’
Wrestlers had first gone on protest against Singh in January, demanding his removal as WFI president.
The protest ended only when the Sports Authority of India (SAI), and Indian Olympic Association (IOA) stepped in to look into the allegations raised against Singh. The sports ministry constituted an oversight committee (OC) chaired by Olympian Mary Kom to probe the matter and also manage the day-to-day functioning of the WFI. Singh was asked to “step aside” from the post he had held since 2011.
Sources had earlier told ThePrint that committee submitted its report this month, but it has not been made public yet.
This is what prompted the second, ongoing protest. According to media reports, the athletes have alleged that they tried calling sports minister Anurag Thakur and members of the OC, but received no response.
The wrestlers are now demanding an FIR against Singh.
The Supreme Court Friday took up a petition filed by the wrestlers, seeking a direction to the police to take action on their complaint against him. Appearing for the Delhi Police, solicitor general Tushar Mehta said the FIR would be filed the same day.
The BJP has meanwhile maintained silence on the matter.
After the first round of allegations, Singh had told the media: “Is anyone saying that the WFI has sexually harassed a wrestler? Only Vinesh (Phogat) has said it. Has anyone (else) come forward and said they were sexually harassed? Even if one wrestler comes forward and says she has been harassed, that day I can be hanged.”
Since then, seven women wrestlers, one of them a minor, have filed a police complaint against Singh at Delhi’s Connaught Place police station, according to wrestlers Vinesh Phogat and Bajrang Punia, who are leading the protest.
The identities of the complainants have not been revealed as they are junior athletes and revealing their identities could ruin their careers, Phogat has said.
On Tuesday, Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud said the names of the complainants would be censored from judicial records to protect their identities.
Singh’s heft in UP
From Gonda to Kaiserganj and from local SP to BJP leaders as well as political experts — all of them are united in their opinion that Singh’s clout in UP is not just a result of his political power but is backed by years spent in the wrestling fraternity, his educational institutes, apparent goodwill and image of a strongman.
Political science professor Dr Rishikesh Singh of Lal Bahadur Shastri Degree College in Gonda said “it was Koshlendra Dutt Ram [a former royal] of Gonda who advised Singh [a law graduate from UP’s Dr RML Avadh University] to enter politics actively”.
Singh did start his political career from the constituency, winning his first Lok Sabha seat in 1991, and then in 1999 from Gonda. He won the Lok Sabha elections from Balrampur in 2004, and from Kaiserganj in 2009, 2014 and 2019. He has reportedly always been a BJP candidate, except in 2009 when he won the election on the SP ticket.
He was also associated with the Ram Janmabhoomi movement in 1989, according to media reports. In the mid-1990s, he was arrested under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act (TADA), for allegedly helping associates of gangster Dawood Ibrahim, and spent several months in Tihar jail.
In 2004, after shifting to Balrampur, the BJP replaced Singh with leader Ghanshyam Shukla as the party’s candidate from Gonda. Shukla was killed in a road accident which, some alleged, was a “murder”. In an interview to Scroll.in, Singh had been quoted as saying that Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had called and said “marwaa diyaa (you had him killed)”.
A third BJP leader from Ayodhya told ThePrint that “not only was he (Singh) one of the prominent faces arrested along with senior BJP leaders L.K. Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and Kalyan Singh after the demolition of the Babri Masjid in 1992, but he was also always ready to help people associated with the VHP and RSS”.
Singh is also known for voting in favour of the Manmohan Singh-led UPA government during the 2008 trust vote in Parliament following the India-US nuclear deal. He was then in the BJP, which had opposed the government on the issue, and was expelled from the party for cross-voting.
It was after this that he had joined the SP.
Currently, his wife Ketki Devi Singh is the president of Gonda Zila Panchayat and his son, Prateek Bhushan Singh, is an MLA from Gonda Sadar seat.
Backbone of educational institutes
Singh runs more than 50 educational institutes, including schools and colleges, in UP’s Bahraich, Gonda, Balrampur, Ayodhya and Shravasti districts, which are believed to be another source of his strength in the state.
A fourth BJP leader told ThePrint: “Singh’s main strength is wrestling, which is his love. The educational institutes are an instrument to spread goodwill and create a base for politics through which he exercises influence. At least a lakh students study pharmacy, law, agriculture and other courses in his institutes.”
“Every year on Singh’s birthday (8 January), students shortlisted via a talent search are rewarded with scooties, motorcycles and cash. This year, Union minister Pankaj Chaudhary had attended the prize distribution event. Singh also waives off the fee of thousands of students every year,” the leader added.
A local SP leader from Gonda termed the educational institutes as Singh’s “backbone which helped the BJP win in constituencies of UP”.
“Students studying in his institutes and their families become the first voters of Brij Bhushan, while thousands of professors and teachers employed there become (BJP) panna pramukhs before elections to finish his political work. This way, Singh does not need any extra effort to win. He also decides the candidates for many seats and every party respects his strength,” added the leader.
‘BJP should not look at political gain’
In public and private, Singh is known to be opinionated and as someone who speaks his mind, not sparing his own party as well. Last October, he targeted the BJP-led government in UP over its handling of the floods in the monsoon. “People were left to the mercy of the gods,” he was reported to have said.
In May last year, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray reportedly cancelled a visit to Ayodhya scheduled for June after Singh warned that he would not be allowed to enter the city unless he apologised for remarks he had allegedly made against North Indians.
Singh also reportedly slammed yoga guru Ramdev, who is known to enjoy a good chemistry with the BJP high command, in December last year for selling “fake ghee” under his Patanjali brand and termed Ramdev the “king of adulteration”.
In the ongoing controversy, political experts are of the view that despite Singh’s muscle power and influence, “the Centre should not look at petty political gains in UP” and act against Singh in the wake of the harassment charges.
Sanjay Gupta, professor of political science at Lucknow University, told ThePrint: “The PM launched the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan to clean physical dirt, but the government should also use the Abhiyan in the sports body (WFI) where clean-up is required. It is ironic that the Centre is trying to promote sports, while sportspersons who made India proud are saying they were sexually harassed and are protesting”.
If the government does not give attention to the matter, it will go against them, Gupta advised, adding: “The message being sent is that the government is not standing with the sportspersons. The Centre should not look at petty political gains in UP, but rather consider what women and youth will think if action is not taken against Singh.”
He pointed out that when the BJP had expelled MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar (convicted for the rape of a minor in Unnao), “then why not take action against Singh?”
In 2018, MJ Akbar, who was minister of state for external affairs in the Modi government, had to put in his papers after harassment allegations by women journalists. Similarly, Karnataka water resources minister Ramesh Jarkiholi resigned from the Yediyurappa cabinet in March 2021 in the wake of sexual harassment charges against him.
But Speaking to ThePrint, BJP leaders from UP pointed out that “Singh does not hold any position in the party or in the cabinet”.
“What action can be taken against an MP? Only the court can save us,” one of them said.
(Edited by Nida Fatima Siddiqui)