By TwoCircles.net Staff Reporter,
Nagpur: In yet another controversial remark, BJP MLA Mangal Prabhat Lodha has claimed that Hindu girls in the state are being converted to Islam through ‘Love jihad’ and sold off in Gulf countries.
Speaking during a debate in the Maharashtra assembly here on Monday, he demanded also forming committees to check such instances in the state.
Mangal Prabhat Lodha (Courtesy: DNA)
Incidentally, Lodha had last week raised the issue of loud speakers atop the Mosques and demanded declaring these as illegal and to take strict measures for controlling the volumes of Azan coming from mosques.
Monday, the first day of second week of the winter session took off with the assembly continuing discussion on the motion of thanks on Governor C Vidyasagar’s address.
Lodha expressed concern over the conversion of Hindu girls in the state and called these instances to be occurrences of ‘Love Jihad’. He alleged that in last five years, nearly 5000 Hindu girls from Aurangabad, Malegaon and Mumbai have been sold off in the Gulf countries after they were converted to Islam.
“There should be one committee for each district that should work in cooperation with local police and people, and it may strictly check occurrences of ‘Love Jihad’ in their respective areas,” Lodha suggested.
Muslima MLAs Asif Shaikh (INC) and Abu Asim Azmi (SP) reacted furiously to Lodha’s statements and said that at a time when instances of forced conversion of Muslims and Christians is taking place, Lodha is trying to mislead the assembly by presenting misinformation that he has no evidence for.
Azmi said, “Everyone knows what has happened in Agra recently where numbers of Muslims were forcefully converted. You (Lodha) are misleading the assembly with untrue facts”.
Speaker Haribhau Bagade did not allow continuing the discussion on the topic and said Agra incidence cannot be linked with Maharashtra and that “we will investigate pertaining to our state to verify truth in Lodha’s allegations.”