Wrestlers issue has dented India's image abroad: Akhilesh

LUCKNOW: Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav has said that the country’s image has been severely dented by the ruling BJP’s blatant display of disrespect towards women wrestlers.

He said that this was a clear indicator of the party’s feudal mindset which has come as a blot to the image of the democratic India in the world.

“News reports of exploitation, harassment and forcefully silencing voices of dissent are being published at the international level and are bringing a bad name to India before the world community. The BJP basically nurtures a feudal mindset where neither women are respected nor the common man. BJP has embarrassed democracy,” he stated on Thursday.

Akhilesh quoted news reports about how the women wrestlers have accused a powerful official of sexual harassment and went to throw away their Olympic medals into Ganga and start a hunger strike after they were evicted from the protest site in New Delhi.

Earlier Akhilesh, who is the leader of the opposition in the state Assembly, had attacked the BJP over the handling of allegations of sexual harassment levelled by women wrestlers against outgoing Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) president Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, who is a BJP MP.

The wrestlers had lodged a police complaint and approached the Supreme Court to get an FIR lodged in the case. They were now demanding the arrest of the BJP MP who has repeatedly pleaded innocence.

“On one hand when elections are around the corner, the BJP talks of ‘Beti Padao, Beti Bachao’ and when these girls raise their voice against harassment and exploitation, the government treats them like this,” Akhilesh said.