Bharatiya Janata Party’s Begusarai MP Giriraj Singh on Tuesday backed yoga guru Ramdev’s remark that the government should enact a law taking away the voting rights of the third child in a family.
“I thank yoga guru Ramdev for raising the matter of population control in India,” Singh tweeted. “This is necessary for progress and maintaining social harmony in the country.”
“India’s population should not be more than 150 crore in the next 50 years as we are not prepared or ready to bear more than that,” Ramdev had claimed on Sunday. “This is only possible when the government makes a law that third child would not be allowed to vote, neither contest election nor he or she enjoys any type of privileges and facilities given by the government.”
If such a law is enacted, people will not give birth to more children, “no matter which religion they belong to”, he added.
All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen chief Asaduddin Owaisi had criticised Ramdev’s remarks, and took a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi. “There is no law preventing people from saying downright unconstitutional things, but why do Ramdev’s ideas receive undue attention?” Owaisi tweeted on Monday. Mocking Ramdev’s yoga poses, he added: “That he can do a thing with his stomach or move about his legs shouldn’t mean @narendramodi lose his right to vote just because he’s the 3rd kid.”
Singh, who defeated Communist Party of India (Marxist) candidate Kanhaiya Kumar in the Lok Sabha elections, has also called for punitive measures to check population in the past. In December, Singh had similarly advocated for a law to check population growth, The Indian Express reported.
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