The debate over "educated politicians" was once again back in the fore after a video of MoS Savitri Thakur misspelling 'Beti Padhao, Beti Bachao' in an effort to scribe it on a board went viral on the internet. The BJP leader's inability to finish the slogan fully before students at an event held at a school in Madhya Pradesh's Dhar kicked up a storm after Congress leaders questioned the kind of leaders being pushed to vital positions by the NDA. The BJP, meanwhile, defended Thakur saying she was writing in a hurry and accused Congress of being "anti-tribal."
Here is the story so far:
What happened? A video of Union minister Savitri Thakur writing the 'Beti Padhao, Beti Bachao' slogan in Hindi incorrectly during an event in Madhya Pradesh has surfaced on social media. The video shows Thakur writing the 'Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao' slogan in Devanagari script on a whiteboard in an incorrect manner. Thakur only managed 'Beti Padao Bachav' while trying to jot the famous campaign name.
The event was organised under the 'School Chalo Abhiyan' on June 18, Tuesday, at a government school at Bramha Kundi in Dhar as a part of welcoming students back after the break.
Who is Savitri Thakur? Lok Sabha MP from Madhya Pradesh's Dhar seat, Savitri Thakur has been appointed as Minister of State for Women and Child Development in Modi 3.0 cabinet.
In her Lok Sabha election affidavit, the 46-year-old two-time MP from Dhar reportedly claimed that she passed her "higher secondary, Urdu Education Board" in 2018, and declared Rs 5.3 crore in assets.
What is BBBP: 'Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao' (BBBP) is a personal campaign of the Government of India that aims to generate awareness and improve the efficiency of welfare services intended for girls. The scheme was launched with an initial funding of ₹100 crore (US$14 million). It mainly targets the clusters in Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Bihar and Delhi.
It was launched on 22 January 2015. It aims to address the issue of the declining child sex ratio image (CSR) and is a national initiative jointly run by the Ministry of Women and Child Development, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and the Ministry of Human Resource Development.
Reacting to the viral video, senior Congress leader K K Mishra questioned the minister's credentials. He said the Constitution should be amended to fix the minimum educational qualification of candidates in the elections. "It is the misfortune of democracy that people who hold constitutional posts and are responsible for big departments are not competent even in their mother tongue. How can they be capable of running their ministry?"
"On the one hand, the country's citizens are being claimed to be literate, while on the other hand, there is lack of literacy among the responsible people. So what is the truth? This is an issue related to the system and not to any individual," Mishra, media advisor to MP Congress president Jitu Patwari, said.
What happened after the video went viral? The Leader of Opposition in the state assembly Umang Singhar, a tribal leader from Dhar district, also took a swipe at Thakur in a post on his X account. "What kind of leadership is this? Does Prime Minister Narendra Modi want only rubber stamp ministers in his government? There is no set standard for how a public representative should be, but at least it should be literate," he stated. Singhar questioned how Thakur could not even write two words properly despite being an MP and Union minister.
This is Union Minister of State for Women & Child Development Savitri Thakur.
— Dipankar Kumar Das (@titu_dipankar) June 20, 2024
She had to write the slogan "Beti Bachao Beti Padhao" on the education awareness chariot in the district.
But, the minister wrote - "Bedhi Padao Bacchav"
According to the election affidavit, she… pic.twitter.com/c0cCkYF2P7
"It can be understood what the children must have felt when they saw her writing incorrectly. What kind of leadership will she provide in the central government can only be imagined? Voters should have thought before electing such a public representative," he said.
How did the BJP react? The saffron party defended its leader and said she made the mistake as she was in a hurry. Dhar district BJP president Manoj Somani alleged that the Congress' uproar over the video shows their "petty and anti-tribal thinking".
"Savitri ji's feelings and sentiments are pure, but Congressmen are not able to keep their sentiments pure. The tribal community will not forgive the insult of a tribal woman," he said. The Congress is not able to digest the growing stature of a tribal woman.
The Modi government also does not want educated leaders who raise questions, because education does not only impart literacy, it also changes the thinking towards the upliftment of the society, Singhar stated.
