Patna, April 13 (PTI) Union minister and senior BJP leader Ashwini Kumar Choubey on Saturday stirred fresh controversy as he rubbished RJD leader Rabri Devi's claims of fissures within the NDA in Bihar and said it would be better if she remains in ghoonghat (head covered with sari or dupatta).
Choubey made the statement while reacting to a claim by the former Bihar chief minister that Nitish Kumar had sought a realignment with RJD, which is headed by her husband Lalu Prasad, sometime after dumping it and returning to the NDA.
Rabri has claimed that former poll strategist Prashant Kishor had visited her place five times as Kumars emissary and that she had turned him away on account of having lost trust in Kumar, the JD(U) president. She had also claimed that it indicated that all was not well between JD(U) and the BJP.
Asked for his comments during his poll campaign at Sitamarhi, the union minister said, "There is no problem in the NDA. What do I say about Rabri Devi ? She is my bhabhi (sister-in-law). It would be better if she remains in ghoonghat".
Choubey, the minister of state for health and family welfare, had been in the news in the past for his statements favouring chopping off of the limbs of government doctors who play truant and blaming patients from Bihar for overcrowding AIIMS, Delhi.
Rabri Devi, who is also the national vice-president of the RJD, issued a video statement which was circulated on the social media by her party wherein she asked Choubey whether he thought his male chauvinism was in consonance with Prime Minister Narendra Modis 'beti bachao beti padhao' campaign.
"Choubeyji, you should tell the people of the country what problem you have with women giving up their ghoonghats and taking part in public life," she said in the video clip.
Rabri Devi, who is currently leader of the opposition in the legislative council, also came up with a couple of tweets - one of these in Hindi and the other in her native Bhojpuri lambasting Choubey for "betraying the pain you feel upon demolition of the caste-based patriarchy which we have demolished in Bihar".
