A senior Congress leader from Madhya Pradesh has suggested reciting the Hanuman Chalisa will protect people from the coronavirus disease (Covid-19), which has affected more than 2.86 lakh people and killed over 8,000 in the country.
Ramesh Saxena, who was a member of the legislative assembly (MLA) for four terms from 1993 to 2008, made the comments while speaking to reporters in Sehore on Thursday.
“I can say it with authority that if members of any family sit together to recite the Hanuman Chalisa 11 times, which will take hardly half an hour, corona can’t touch them,” Saxena said.
Saxena, who won assembly elections once as an Independent candidate and three times on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ticket and joined the Congress in January last year, also offered an explanation.
“There is a line in Hanuman Chalisa - Nase rog hare sab peera, japat nirantar Hanuman veera (Constant recital of name of Lord Hanuman cures all diseases and pain). We should trust it. Trust gives us the result,” he said.
Before this, Saxena had similar advice to stop crops from being damaged during rains and hailstorm in 2018. He had asked people to recite the Hanuman Chalisa at least 500 times every day.
{{/usCountry}}Before this, Saxena had similar advice to stop crops from being damaged during rains and hailstorm in 2018. He had asked people to recite the Hanuman Chalisa at least 500 times every day.
{{/usCountry}}“We all have a strong belief in the God and we all do prayers but such suggestions will only lead to confusion in public when we all are fighting Covid-19,” Dr KL Sahu, the former director of the health department, said.
BJP was quick to react to the ex-MLA’s suggestion.
“Recital of holy texts and our faith in God give a boost to our morale and thus immunity power to deal with any crisis but it doesn’t mean that any Covid patient can be cured with the recital of any text only,” Rajneesh Agrawal, the spokesperson of the BJP’s state unit, said.
“When we are in public life we should not make any such statement that any person believes it blindly and avoids a medical treatment,” Agrawal added.
The Congress, however, distanced itself from Saxena’s remedy and said it was not the party’s stand.
“I am also a devotee of Lord Hanuman but religion and spirituality give us the strength to face and overcome any crisis in life,” Bhupendra Gupta, the Congress spokesperson, said.
“However, when our PM exhorts people to ring bells and blow conches and the health minister in Madhya Pradesh says it’s not allopathy or homoeopathy but it’s sympathy that cures a Covid patient, there are aberrations like such a statement that came from the Congress leader,” he added.