Vinesh, Bajrang in Cong: Singed already by wrestler protest, BJP expects no further damage in Haryana

Talking about Phogat, former Haryana home minister and senior BJP leader Anil Vij told reporters: “Agar woh desh ki beti sey Congress ki beti banana chaahti hai, to hamein kya aitraz hai (If Vinesh wants to become the Congress’s daughter instead of being the whole country’s daughter, what objection can we have)?”

But, Vij added, this was proof that “it was because of their (the Congress’s) instigation that the protests (against Brij Bhushan) were going on”. “Otherwise the matter would have been settled much earlier,” he said. “The Congress was trying to bring these players to its side from the very first day.”

Another BJP leader said that with the agitation having already taken “a political turn”, there was nothing surprising in the wrestlers’ decision.

BJP Haryana president Mohan Lal Badoli claimed to The Indian Express in a recent interview that the Congress had “used” the wrestlers for its politics, “gaining strength from their protest but not empowering them in return”.

The strongest statement linking Phogat and Punia’s affiliation with the Congress to the wrestlers’ protest had earlier come from Manohar Lal Khattar, who was the CM at the height of the farmer and wrestlers’ agitation. Recently, after the two met Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in New Delhi, Khattar, who is now a Union minister, said “the athletes had got trapped in a political maze” during the protests.

“What started back then is reaching its climax now. The wrestlers’ protests were politically motivated. These people (wrestlers) are seeking a ticket from the Congress. This means that there is a nexus. If it wasn’t clear then, it is absolutely clear now.”

While refusing to talk much on the issue, Brij Bhushan told reporters that what he had said at the time of the protests was coming true. As per a PTI report, attending an event held at a private school in Gonda in Uttar Pradesh, he said: “Senior Congress leaders from Haryana Deepender Singh Hooda and Bhupinder Singh Hooda are hatching a conspiracy against me. Whatever I had said on day one, I stand by it. And today, the same thing is being said by the entire country.”

A BJP leader from Haryana said that, nevertheless, they did not apprehend Phogat’s entry into the Congress to cause them any serious harm given the damage already caused to the party in the state due to the farm agitation and wrestlers’ protests.

In fact, the leader said, people might not take kindly to Phogat’s decision to plunge into politics so soon after she had been celebrated as a national hero for the way in which she had been denied an Olympic medal. But that didn’t mean that those people would vote for the BJP, the leader admitted.

BJP Panchkula MLA and Assembly Speaker Gian Chand Gupta called the wrestlers’ decision to join the Congress or even contest the elections as “their personal choice”. “Vinesh Phogat has made the entire nation proud. Bajrang Punia had also been a renowned wrestler. But sports and politics are different things… the daon-pench (the moves) are different. (At the same time) I believe they shall bring something good to politics, too.”

One person who hinted at being disappointed was Sakshi Malik, the third face of the wrestlers’ protest along with Phogat and Punia. Calling their decision to join the Congress “their personal choice”, Malik said: “I believe we should make sacrifices. Our agitation, the fight for women should not get a wrong name. From my end, the agitation continues. I too had received offers, but I wanted to take what I started to the end. Unless the (Wrestling) Federation is cleaned up and the exploitation of women ends, my fight will continue.”