Gujarat Education and Revenue Minister Bhupendrasinh Chudasama, and Social Justice and Empowerment Minister Atmaram Parmar attended an event organised by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) state unit to felicitate exorcists in Botad district on Sunday, January 12.
In a video, the ministers can be seen on the dais watching a couple of exorcists beating themselves with metal chains to live music, NDTV reported. The ministers also shook hands with around 100 exorcists as part of their felicitation event.
Congress leader Arjun Modhvadiya slammed the BJP ministers for attending the event. “Our Constitution has a provision which talks about eliminating superstition and building scientific temper. And here we have two ministers doing exactly opposite. By attending such an event they have violated the spirit of the Constitution just for votes,” he said.
Prominent rationalist and NGO ‘Bharat Jan Vigyan Jatha’ head Jayant Pandya said he would write to Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani asking him to stop ministers from attending events that promote superstition. “This is for the first time I have seen ministers attending such an event, where exorcists were felicitated. This is very shameful. I will write to the CM to stop government functionaries from attending such programmes which spread superstition,” said Pandya.