Are you Pak supporters: BJP minister to journos not chanting 'Bharat Mata Ki Jai'

Patna (Bihar): Bihar Minister Vinod Kumar Singh sparked a controversy by asking media persons to raise their arms and chant "Bharat Mata ki Jai", but when a few refrained from doing so, he asked "are you supporters of Pakistan?"

Addressing the media in a function in Patna on Tuesday, he raised slogans of Bharat Mata ki Jai and asked people present there to respond by raising their hands, after which Singh said, "I can see some people are not raising their hands, are those supporters of Pakistan?"

"First you are a son of ‘Bharat Mata' then you could be a brother of media and electronic media," said Singh.

Singh is the Minister of Mines and Geology from Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) quota in the Janata Dal-United-BJP government led by Nitish Kumar.

During the Bihar assembly polls in 2015, BJP Member of Parliament (MP) Ashwani Kumar Choubey had said chief minister Nitish Kumar and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Prasad should "go to Pakistan".

The comment had followed a controversial statement by his party colleague Giriraj Singh who had said, "Nitish Kumar and Lalu Prasad want to make Bihar a Pakistan."

Earlier, BJP President Amit Shah had said that if his party lost the Bihar assembly elections, firecrackers would be burst in Pakistan.