Ananth Kumar Hegde, the Union minister of state for skill development, was involved in yet another controversy after a video of his speech in his constituency surfaced that showed him asking how Congress president Rahul Gandhi got his surname, despite being a “Muslim’s son”.

Hegde was speaking at a function at a temple in Bhatkal taluk, which comes in his Uttara Kannada Lok Sabha constituency, on Saturday, local MLA Sunil Naik confirmed.

The union minister attacked Gandhi for asking for proof that the air strikes conducted by the Indian Air Force in the aftermath of the Pulwama terror attack, where over 40 CRPF personnel were killed, had hit the intended targets.

“The whole world is talking about our courage and America, too. But some people in our country have doubts. Apparently, they want proof of the attack,” Hegde said. “But can a Muslim’s son provide proof as to how he became a Gandhi, a Brahmin? Can this outsider born to a Muslim father and Christian mother give proof of how he became a Brahmin? Will he give DNA proof?”

The union minister also claimed that the practice of sending home dead soldiers’ bodies was started by former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee. “Before [Atal Bihari] Vajpayee became prime minister the bodies of soldiers were not sent back to their homes. For the first time, after Vajapayee became PM, the bodies were sent back to their homes,” he said.

“Earlier the Congress didn’t even have the capacity to send bodies back home. Since we started sending bodies back home these suspicions have been raised,” he said. “All these days, when soldiers died their bodies weren’t returned, and there were only talks after the deaths. First round of talks, second round, third round… there was nothing other than that,” Hegde said.

He claimed that no leader would even visit the families of the dead to express their condolence earlier. “When I went with the body [of a soldier killed in Pulwama] to Tamil Nadu, the soldier’s wife, who was one-and-a-half months pregnant, held my hand and said Jai Hind. That woman said her daughter was saying she had to be made CRPF and she has to go attack Pakistan.”

Hegde said this “drive” did not exist earlier. “Today it is not the India of tears, in fact those who bring tears to us are crying now, that is today’s India. India has changed…This is how you build a country… on minds of steel,” Hegde said, adding that this was because of the central government, which was ensuring that would become the third superpower in 10 years.

However the BJP has distanced itself from Hegde’s remark on Rahul Gandhi. Responding to Hegde’s comments, BJP state general secretary N Ravikumar said it was not right to make such remarks. “It is not correct to make such statements,” he said. “We have informed him and the leadership, let’s see what happens,” he added, when asked if the party would take action against Hegde.

State social welfare minister and Congress leader Priyank Kharge said it was condemnable that a union minister was repeatedly making such comments. “He has such an important ministry of skill development at a time when jobs growth has been low. Maybe because he does not want to talk about that he is resorting to making such personal comments against another,” he said.

Kharge said the signal contribution of the central government over five years was not Make in India but manufacturing lies. “The message seems to have come from the top rungs of the BJP and Sangh Parivar to indulge in conspiracy theories and come out with distorted alternative versions of history,” he said.

First Published: Mar 12, 2019 10:54 IST