New Delhi: The government today came up with a strong counter to the claims of Congress leader Kumari Selja that she had faced discrimination at Gujarat's Dwarkadheesh temple because of her caste. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley led the attack citing the temple's visitor book where Selja was all praise for the arrangements there.
Jaitley brought to the House a copy of the page of the Visitor's book of the temple in which Selja had put down her remarks along with her signature. Jaitley read out Selja's comments to the House: "With Lord Krishna's blessings, had a very good darshan. The upkeep and maintenance of the premises is excellent. May the Lord bless all those who are fortunate enough to come here for his blessings".
The remarks with Selja's signature and a stamp of the temple were registered on February 22, 2013.
Jaitley's comments came amid chaos in the House created by the Congress members over the issue. The comments were read out again by the Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi.
Participating in a debate on the Constitution on Monday, Selja had alleged that she had faced discrimination at the temple when she visited there as a Union Minister some years back as she was asked about her caste. She further alleged that "this was also a form of the Gujarat model", an apparent attack on Narendra Modi.
Jaitley had immediately asked her then if she had raised the issue with the then Chief Minister Narendra Modi or Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to which Selja had refused to respond. "I choose not to answer that," she had said.
With inputs from PTI
