Rahul Gandhi's State Of Mind Needs Forensic Analysis: Hardeep Singh Puri | Exclusive

New Delhi: Union Minister For Housing and Urban Affairs Hardeep Singh Puri has said that a forensic analysis is required on Rahul Gandhi about his state of mind when he made the statement on people from the Sikh community wearing turban and ‘kada’.

Addressing a gathering of several hundred Indian Americans in Herndon, a Virginia suburb of Washington DC, on Monday, Rahul Gandhi accused the RSS of considering some religions, languages and communities of being inferior to others and said the fight in India is about this and not about politics.

"First of all, you have to understand what the fight is about. The fight is not about politics. That is superficial," Gandhi said as he asked one of the Sikh attendees in the front rows to give his name. "What is your name, brother with the turban," he asked.

"The fight is about whether a Sikh is going to be allowed to wear his turban in India or a kada in India. Or he, as a Sikh, is going to be able to go to a gurdwara. That's what the fight is about. And not just for him, for all religions," said Gandhi, who is on a four-day visit to the US, which began Saturday.

Speaking to Republic TV's Editor-In-Chief Arnab Goswami on the debate, Hardeep Singh Puri reacted to Congress leader's statement and questioned, “whether Rahul Gandhi made this statement because he wants to incite trouble in India or is he strongly influenced by someone who does not wear a turban or wear a ‘patka’ which represents a lunatic fringe and espouses a separatist call… I don't know.”

Hardeep Puri Singh said that Sikhs have never shied away from wearing turban and they don't need anybody's permission to wear it.

Responding to when asked do you think Rahul Gandhi is taking Khalistani sympathiser Gurpatwant Singh Pannun's line, Hardeep Puri Singh said, “…A lot of people are saying that words used by him resemble Pannun… but it's a dangerous statement, he does not know what he is for and trying to create division through lies."

The Union Minister also said that it's a pack of lies to suggest that Sikhs in India today face any sense of anxiety or uncertainty about their desire to wear turban.

I have never come across a single statement that anyone is having objection to Sikh wearing turbans, the Union Minister added. 

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