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BJP leaders lash out at Nitish over comment linking women to population control
Nitish Kumar made the comments during an event in Vaishali.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is under fire from the opposition after he - at an event - linked education among women to population control. The Janta Dal United leader - whose liquor ban move in the past was said to have drawn praise from the female voter base - was talking about family planning at an event in Vaishali when he said: “When women will get educated, only then will the population come under control. We, men, don’t think so much about family planning.”
Suggesting that men do not take responsibility in such matters, he further said: “When women are educated, they get to know everything about how to protect themselves (from getting pregnant).”
The leaders of the BJP have latched on to the comment. Nitish Anand, the party’s general secretary, called the comment “sexist” while speaking to the media. On Twitter, he shared the video of the event on Saturday, and wrote in Hindi: “Women should study… that’s fine but why defame men?”
Another BJP leader, Samrat Choudhary, the leader of opposition in Bihar assembly, also lashed out at Nitish Kumar. "The indecent words used by Chief Minister Mr. Nitish Kumar are the height of insensitivity. By using such words, he is tarnishing the dignity of the post of Chief Minister," he wrote in Hindi on Twitter.
Nitish Kumar parted ways with the BJP last year as he returned to the Grand Alliance (Mahagathbandhan). Ever since, the BJP's leaders and Kumar and the BJP have hit out at each other publicly on multiple instances. Nitish Kumar has also been collaborating with opposition leaders in a bid to put up a united front against the ruling party at the centre ahead of the 2024 elections.
