New Delhi: Former Union minister Pratap Chandra Sarangi, the BJP MP from Odisha’s Balasore, alleged Thursday that he was injured as a result of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi pushing an MP when members of the ruling party and the Opposition were locked in a face-to-face standoff on Parliament premises. The allegation against Gandhi, Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha, came in the midst of a protest by non-BJP parties against Union Home Minister Amit Shah for remarks they see as a ‘disrespect’ to B.R. Ambedkar.
Following the incident, Union ministers Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Pralhad Joshi visited 69-year-old Sarangi and Mukesh Rajput, another BJP MP injured in the standoff, at RML Hospital. The BJP has approached Parliament Street police station to file an FIR against Gandhi, accusing him of “physical assault”.
Sarangi, who was once referred to in sections of the media as “Odisha’s Modi”, has alleged that “Rahul Gandhi pushed an MP who fell on me after which I fell down”.
Gandhi denied the charge and accused BJP MPs of blocking his way to Parliament at Makar Dwar. The Congress also alleged that party president Mallikarjun Kharge and Wayanad MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra were heckled by BJP MPs during the standoff Thursday.
Kharge, 82, in a letter to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla alleged he was “pushed” by BJP MPs and sustained knee injuries.
Allegations by Sarangi, meanwhile, have brought back to focus the BJP leader who is said to have once nurtured a desire to become a monk.
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Who is Pratap Chandra Sarangi
Elected twice to the Lok Sabha and Odisha Legislative Assembly, Pratap Chandra Sarangi is hailed in some political circles for his ‘austere’ lifestyle.
When he was inducted into the Modi government in 2019, pictures of Sarangi’s thatched house and him riding a bicycle were widely circulated. His elevation was seen as a reward for keeping a low profile while working to expand the BJP’s footprint in Odisha—where the party came to power for the first time in June this year. Modi had once, in 2017, famously referred to Sarangi as the BJP’s oldest sainik (soldier) in Odisha. He was the only of eight BJP MPs from Odisha to be inducted into the Union Cabinet in 2019.
As ThePrint reported earlier, Sarangi was vying for the post of president of BJP’s Odisha unit in 2016 but lost out to Basanta Kumar Panda. And in 2019, the party chose Dharmendra Pradhan over him to lead the party going into state elections.
Born on 4 January 1955 in a family of Brahmins in Gopinathpur Nilgiri in Odisha’s Balasore district. Sarangi attained a Bachelor of Arts degree from Fakir Mohan College under Utkal University. As the story goes, he wanted to become a monk with Ramakrishna Mission, but was encouraged to take up social work. He then became associated with the RSS and VHP.
As president of Bajrang Dal’s Odisha unit, he reportedly spearheaded a movement for protection of cows. He is also credited with opening schools in remote, tribal-dominated areas of Mayurbhanj and Balasore. He also worked briefly as a clerk at Nilagiri college.
Sarangi was Bajrang Dal coordinator in Odisha in 1999 when Australian Graham Staines and his two sons, aged 6 and 10, were killed by a mob in Keonjhar. Dara Singh, a Bajrang Dal member was among the 12 convicted.
He was also among the more than 60 members of Bajrang Dal, VHP and Durga Vahini arrested for storming Odisha assembly in 2001, vandalising the building and assaulting several including lawmakers. They had been demanding that the then disputed land in Ayodhya be handed over to the Hindus to build a temple dedicated to the Hindu deity Ram.
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