Karnataka Congress working president Satish Jarkiholi. ANI
New Delhi: A day after Karnataka Congress working president Satish Jarkiholi stirred a controversy by claiming that the word ‘Hindu’ is Persian and has a very dirty meaning, the leader on Tuesday remained defiant saying that he will not only apologise but also resign as an MLA if proven wrong.
“Let everyone prove I’m wrong. If I am wrong, I’ll resign as MLA and not just apologise for my statement,” said Jarkiholi.
Jarkiholi said that many books mention the “Persian” roots of the word ‘Hindu’.
“There’s nothing wrong in what I said. There are hundreds of records about how this Persian word (Hindu) came. This has been mentioned in Swamy Dayanand Saraswati’s book ‘Satyarth Prakash’, Dr GS Patil’s book ‘Basava Bharatha’ and Bal Gangadhar Tilak’s ‘Kesari’ newspaper as well. These are just 3-4 examples, there are many such articles available on Wikipedia or any website, you should please read it,” NDTV report quoted him as saying in a video statement.
Jarkiholi had on Monday claimed that the word ‘Hindu’ is Persian and has a very dirty meaning.
He also said that “a word and a religion from elsewhere is being forcefully imposed on people here”, and demanded that there should be a proper debate in this regard.
“They speak about Hindu Dharm…this that, where did the Hindu word come from? Is it ours? It is Persian. Persian is from Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan. What is Bharat’s relationship with it? Then, how did Hindu become yours? There should be a debate on this,” Jarkiholi had said while addressing an event at Nippani on Sunday.
“Look at ‘Wikipedia’, where this word (Hindu) comes from? It is not yours. Then why are you placing it at such a high position? If you understand its meaning, you will be ashamed. The meaning of the word Hindu, is very dirty. I’m not saying this, Swamiji has said this, it’s on websites.”
“A religion and a word from somewhere else is being forcefully imposed on us, there should be a debate on this,” added the MLA from Yamakanmardi .
Reacting to its own party leader’s statements, the All India Congress Committee (AICC) termed it as deeply unfortunate and rejected it “unequivocally”.
Responding to this, AICC General Secretary in-charge of Karnataka, Randeep Singh Surjewala said “the statement attributed to Satish Jarkiholi is deeply unfortunate and deserves to be rejected. We condemn it unequivocally.”
“Hinduism is a way of life and a civilisational reality. Congress built our nation to respect every religion, belief and faith. This is the essence of India,” he said in a tweet.
With inputs from agencies
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