New Delhi: Trinamool's nominated candidate from Rajya Sabha, Sagarika Ghose took umbrage over 'lewd' comments made on Bengali women in the election poster of Bhojpuri singer Pawan Singh whom the BJP has fielded from Asansol for Lok Sabha.
Ghose, who is also a renowned journalist, in a video posted on X slammed the BJP for 'objectifying women from West Bengal. She mentioned that posters of the videos read 'Bengal Wali Maal', a deroghatory term for Bengali girls.
The poster also contains the name and picture of Pawan Singh. "PM @narendramodi arrives in Bengal and holds forth on “nari Shakti”. The next day the @BJP4India fields a candidate from Asansol who is pictured on videos in which Bengali women are referred to as “Bengal wali maal.” Nari shakti, @BJP4India style," she said in the X post.
Soon after the controversy, Pawan Singh withdrew his candidature from Asansol on Sunday, a day after the BJP named him as its candidate from the constituency currently represented by Trinamool Congress's Shatrughan Sinha.
In a post on X, Singh thanked the BJP leadership for his candidature but added that he will not be able to contest from Asansol "due to some reason".
Though he did not specify the reason behind his decision, his candidature had drawn criticism from the TMC, which is in power in West Bengal, which alleged that many of his songs were crude and depicted women, including those from the state, in a vulgar way.
Asansol is home to a sizeable migrant population, and the BJP had hoped that Singh would be an effective counter to Sinha, the actor-politician who was in the saffron party for decades before walking out in 2019.
The BJP apparently decided to nudge Singh to step aside from the contest to defuse the controversy, more so when the party seized on the Sandeshkhali row to go after the TMC leadership.
