Protests erupted after noted folk singer Devi sang “Ishwar Allah Tero Naam (God and Allah is Your Name)” during a rendition of Raghupati Raghava Raja Ram at an event in Patna to commemorate the life of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
While the protesters forced the singer to stop singing the bhajan – which is closely associated with Mahatma Gandhi – BJP leader and former Union minister under Vajpayee Shahnawaz Hussain called the disruption “the height of intolerance”.
The identity of the protestors, which was attended by around 50 people at the event held at the Bapu Sabhagar auditorium in Patna, has yet to be identified. Former Union Minister Ashwini Kumar Choubey, who organized the program in association with the NGO Dinkarshodh Sansthan, said the incident ‘should not happen’.
The program titled “Main Atal Rahunga” was intended to commemorate the former Prime Minister’s contribution on the occasion of his birth anniversary. Apart from Chaubey, who was also a minister in the Vajpayee government, there were three others who served as Union ministers under Vapeyi’s prime ministership – Dr CP Thakur, Sanjay Paswan, and Shahnawaz Hussain.
Folk singer Devi told The Indian Express that the organizers asked her to sing a bhajan at the event. “I was also called to felicitate on this occasion. The organizers were requested to sing hymns. As we gathered to commemorate Vajpayee ji, I thought it appropriate to sing Mahatma Gandhi’s favorite hymn, Raghupati Raghava Raja Ram,” she said.
She said everything went smoothly when she started the bhajan, but when I started singing the verse ‘Ishwar Allah Tero Naam’, there was opposition from a section of the audience. I had to stop the song immediately. After Ashwini Kumar Choubey pacified the crowd, I sang the Chhath song … but I was shocked at the opposition to Gandhi’s favorite hymn which is sung and heard with great reverence all over the world. What happened was unfortunate.”
Shahnawaz Hussain, who was Vajpayee’s youngest cabinet colleague, said: “I had quoted Atal ji in my speech. He used to say, ‘Chote Dil Se Koi Bada Nahi Hota’. Protesting Bhajan is the height of intolerance. I felt very ashamed and embarrassed.”
Sanjay Paswan said that the protest against Bhajan was unacceptable. “We live in a world of assimilated ideologies of happiness (Gandhi, Lohia, Ambedkar and Deendayal Upadhyay).”
Condemning the incident, Chaubey said, ‘What happened should not have happened. This was not what citizenship demanded at all. I said the same from the stage as I tried to calm the crowd down.
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