A group of seers along with lawyers from the Varanasi region have filed complaints at the local police station against the Lok Sabha Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi and independent member of parliament Pappu Yadav over their hurting religious sentiments through staging of theatrical skit on Ram Temple donation embezzlement inside the Parliament house complex.
This political row originated from a theatrical skit performed at the Parliament house complex on July 31. As a part of his protest Purnia Member of Parliament Pappu Yadav has appeared wearing saffron robes resembling a priest who was holding picture of Lord Ram Lalla along with donation box in hand. He had few fellow MPs of opposition playing role of devotees who came to donate money to the donation box.
However, the "priest" in the skit, that was Yadav himself, quietly stashed the donation amount and not placed in the box that angered Samajwadi Party's Member of Parliament who played the part of a devotee and confronted Yadav for this. "Chanda chor gaddi chhod" along with other sloganeering demanding answer from Union Home Minister Amit Shah in the House took place through the whole skit.
The popularity of the skit among social media platforms led to an immediate reaction from Varanasi. Seers wrote a written complaint at Varanasi's Kotwali Police Station, and another lot of lawyers wrote their own written complaint, stating that the members of Parliament have caused a hurt sentiment to Hindus. The head priest of Patalpuri Math Jagadguru Balak Das Devacharya alleged that this skit is a disgrace to seer community by depicting them as thieves.
The Deputy Commissioner of Police, Kashi Zone, Gaurav Banswal stated that videos which depict Yadav dressed up as a Monk in Parliament premise skit went viral and a written complaint was submitted by seers that their religious sentiments were hurt.
He further clarified that, as of now, the name of the offender who made this skit is Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav.
Besides this, lawyers from Varanasi also conducted a protest against Pappu Yadav regarding his act and made a written complaint that includes the names of both Pappu Yadav and Rahul Gandhi and demanding legal actions from both leaders.
Lawyer Vineet Kumar Singh told the reporters that it is a written complaint that they made for Cantoonment police authorities regarding insulting Sanatan Dharma and demanded to register a case against the two MPs.
The complaints coming from Varanasi were far from being isolated, as a day prior, another similar complaint had already been made in the Jahangirpuri police station of the national capital.
In Delhi, the complaint was filed by a group of representatives consisting of BJP MP Bansuri Swaraj, along with two state MLA Anil Sharma and Karnail Singh.
The delegates alleged that opposition MPs including Rahul Gandhi, Pappu Yadav, and SP’s Awadhesh Prasad have hurt the religious sentiments of Hinduism through their actions.
According to Delhi DCP Sachin Sharma, the enactment that was conducted inside the parliamentary precincts is considered an open mockery and insult to the religious traditions of Hinduism. Moreover, according to complainants, the wearing of saffron clothes represents a concerted effort to make an impression that all the seers are actually thieves, something which the complainants totally reject.
The list of accused MPs involved in these cases has expanded from just including Rahul Gandhi and Pappu Yadav to Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav and Awadhesh Prasad owing to their involvement in this mock theater performance. However, the core allegation present in each of these complaints centers on how the enactment – based on a fictional box collecting donations and the character of a "thieving priest" – constitutes an insult directed towards the sacred objects and religious rituals of the Hindu community, with implications against the group of temple priests and devotees as a whole.
This event was condemned severely by leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and has been described as an effort on the part of certain members of the opposition to create a scandal about the Ram Temple and saffron symbol attached to it.
On the other hand, what the opposition tried to achieve with this act of theatrical performance was attracting public attention to accusations of misappropriation of funds collected for donations from the followers of the Ram Temple.
Therefore, one can say that this incident was placed between two opposing discourses, namely politics and religion.
