A week after getting 'Y' category security, Bihar BJP MLA claims death threat from 'jihadis'

Patna: A BJP MLA in Bihar, who was among the 10 party leaders from the state to have been provided 'Y' category security cover last week, on Friday claimed to have received death threats from those upset over his tirade against "jihadis".

Haribhushan Thakur Bachol told reporters outside the assembly that he received "dozens of telephone calls" on Thursday night while he was on the way to Patna from his Bisfi assembly constituency in the north Bihar district of Madhubani.

"I have lodged a police complaint with the Sachivalaya police station and also informed the Speaker, Vijay Kumar Sinha, who is the custodian of the House," said Bachol.

Asked whom he suspected to be the callers, the MLA shot back "of course, those who have a problem with my campaign against the jihadis and their Gajwa-e-Hind" (a prophecy disputably attributed to Prophet Mohammad that India will be Islamised one day).

The BJP legislator, who remains in news for expressing views that border on the extreme, had hit the headlines a few days ago when he blamed the protests against the Agnipath scheme of recruitment in armed forces on "jihadis opposed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi".

Bachol found himself in the company of party veterans like state president Sanjay Jaiswal, Deputy CM Renu Devi and multiple-term Darbhanga MLA Sanjay Saraogi last week when his name figured among the 10 BJP leaders for whom the Union Home Ministry approved 'Y' category security.

Bachol tasted electoral success for the first time in 2005 when he won as an Independent from Bisfi after a local dispute had left the assembly segment communally charged.

He joined the BJP after losing his seat to the RJD in 2010. Serving his first term as a BJP MLA, he had hit the headlines a few months back when he sought disqualification of AIMIM legislators for their reluctance to sing the national song inside the assembly.

Last year, he had suggested renaming Bakhtiyarpur, named after Bakhtiyar Khilji, a 12th-century Afghan general who had invaded Bihar, as "Nitish Nagar" after Chief Minister Nitish Kumar who was born there.

Kumar had strongly disapproved of the suggestion.