BHOPAL : BJP MLA and former Mandhya Pradesh minister Surendra Patwa threatened a police officer for turning off former CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s mike reportedly in line with the poll panel’s model code of conduct during an election rally in Raisen district.
The incident happened on Thursday night in Bhojpur assembly segment of Vidisha Lok Sabha constituency from where Chouhan is the BJP candidate. A viral video of the incident has triggered a political controversy.
While Chouhan was addressing the rally in the industrial town Mandideep, police station in-charge Mahendra Singh Thakur reportedly turned off the former CM’s mike as the poll code suggests that the candidates should end their campaign by 10 pm.
The former CM was subsequently seen in the video questioning the cop’s conduct. “How did you turn the mike off, it’s not 10 pm yet, restore it, just remove him (concerned cop) from here,” he said while looking at his watch.
MLA Patwa, who is the nephew of former CM Sunderlal Patwa, subsequently threatened the cop from the stage. “Come here, I’ll get you thrown to such a place that it wouldn’t be possible to return,” Patwa was seen shouting at the cop in the video, before local BJP leaders and security personnel stopped him from going towards the police officer. The mike was later turned on and Chouhan continued his speech.
Posting the 28-second video on X on Friday, the Congress state unit wrote, “Look at the arrogance of BJP’s former CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan, raising questions from the BJP platform on the implementation of the election code of conduct and Surendra Patwa misbehaving and threatening the police station in-charge Mahendra Singh Thakur. Shivraj Ji, this is the level of a former CM? Extremely indecent and condemnable act.”
Vidisha LS seat, which Chouhan earlier won five times, goes to polls in the third phase on May 7.