Sam Pitroda, who has been under the scanner in recent months for his controversial statements, has been re-appointed as the president of the Indian Overseas Congress with immediate effect.
Pitroda sparked a major controversy during the Lok Sabha polls and unleashed a racist tirade while speaking out about people from different ethnic groups who had made India their home.
Pitroda said in an interview with 'The Statesman': “We have survived for 75 years in a very happy environment where people could live together, apart from a few fights here and there. We could hold together a country as diverse as India, where people in the East look like Chinese, people in the West look like Arabs, people in the North look like whites and maybe people in the South look like Africans.”
Following the comments, he faced major criticism from BJP and NDA allies with many commenting that such comments represent the 'Congress' mentality.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar slamming Pitroda had said in a PTI interview: “I think what he said is probably the conversation in the circles he lives in, possibly shared by people he has mentored, and I think there were two parts of it which were disturbing to me.”
“One of what you called typecasting and racial stereotyping. I think that was disturbing to me. The second was actually the feeling that you know what the comment implies – that there are very different people, and somehow someone put it together. It took some effort to bring them all together to make India even more disturbing,” he said.
Pitroda later resigned as head of the party's overseas unit
Earlier, Pitroda was an advisor to former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and was close to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, accompanying him during his foreign visits.
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Published: Jun 26, 2024 8:10 PM IST