Mumbai, May 7 : Maharashtra Congress spokesperson Gopaldada Tiwari on Sunday demanded that President Draupadi Murmu speak out on the issue of alleged sexual harassment of female athletes and ill-treatment being suffered by women journalists while performing their professional duty.
He said in a press statement here that despite a tribal woman being the country’s President, national-level women wrestlers, who made the country proud by winning medals, are now agitating at Jantar-Mantar in Delhi against BJP MP Brijbhushan Singh in a case of alleged sexual harassment.
A woman journalist Sakshi Joshi, who went there to cover the ‘satyagraha movement’ of the female players on the streets and to know their problems, was badly treated by the Delhi Police, he alleged.
While condemning these acts as “reprehensible”, he questioned, “How is Her Excellency President Draupadi Murmu tolerating this kind of thing going on in the capital of the country?”
Tiwari said Murmu should not forget that she is occupying the post of President due to the Constitution of a free, democratic India.
“But if women athletes have to fight endlessly for justice and if women journalists are not safe in the country, then what should the countrymen expect from the President who herself is a woman,” he said in the press statement.
Recalling the contribution of former prime minister and Congress leader late Rajiv Gandhi who had taken steps for the empowerment of women by giving them 33 percent reservation in local self-government bodies, he remembered the legacy left behind by Rajmata Jijau, Rani Laxmibai of Jhansi, Savitri Bai Phule and Ramabai Ambedkar and said it is time to introspect whether Her Excellency the President has the moral right to remain in office if atrocities against women continue unabated.
The Congress leader added on the one hand (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi is seeking votes in poll-bound Karnataka in the name of ‘Bajrang Bali’ under the veil of Hindutva. Still, on the other hand it is saving the ‘Ravani’ oppressors of ‘Bajranga-worshiping women mallas (wrestlers)’ and wondered if is this the real identity of BJP.
