PATNA: Bihar Congress leader Chandrika Yadav on Monday said he has sent legal notice to Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) MP Dayanidhi Maran for his purported statement that people who study only Hindi in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh “build houses” and “clean toilets” in Tamil Nadu, saying he will file move court if Maran does not apologise within 15 days.
Yadav, a former legislator, said he has acted in his personal capacity and that the legal notice has nothing to do with the Bihar Congress. “I did not make the DMK as a party, nor did I file the complaint as a Congress leader. I felt that Maran’s remark was an attack on the self-respect and pride of Biharis, their invaluable contribution in the development of various states,” the Congress leader told HT.
Chandrika Yadav’s statement on Monday comes a day after deputy chief minister and Rashtriya Janata Dal leader Tejashwi Yadav said the DMK leader’s comments were reprehensible and condemnable.
In a viral video, which DMK leaders said was from 2019, Maran is purportedly heard comparing the job prospects of those who have studied only Hindi with those who also know English.
“Only because they (people here) studied English, today they earn fat salaries in IT companies. They say ‘Hindi Hindi’. You know well who build buildings. Those who study only Hindi in Bihar build houses for us in Tamil Nadu, sweep roads and clean toilets,” Maran was heard saying in the video that has now gone viral.
HT could not independently verify the veracity of the video.
The Bihar Congress’s other two allies, the RJD and the Janata Dal United, have spoken out against the reported comments.
The RJD, the JD(U) and the DMK are all constituents of the Opposition’s INDIA bloc.
Chandrika Yadav said that if Maran looks around, he will see Biharis holding prestigious positions in the bureaucracy and other professions. “A Bihari was the director general police (DGP) in Tamil Nadu till recently. There are many senior bureaucrats in Telangana and other southern states,” said the Congress leader.
It was on a complaint filed by Chandrika Yadav against former Jehanabad MP Arun Kumar in 2015 that Kumar was convicted in 2022 and sentenced to three years in jail for his remarks against Nitish Kumar. “I will file the complaint case in a Jehanabad court once the court is reopened after the winter vacation,” Yadav said.
The DMK has said the remark was from a 2019 video and “has been misconstrued to create confusion”.
“It was only meant to convey that English is the language used across the world for all white-collar jobs. People from different parts of the country are living and working peacefully in Tamil Nadu. BJP is peddling a fake narrative to bring a bad name to the DMK,” deputy secretary of DMK’s state IT wing, Salem Dharanidharan, said on Sunday.