Patna:

BJP MLA Mithilesh Kumar distributed swords among girls during the Vijayadashami celebration in Bihar’s Sitamarhi district on Saturday.

“If any evil person dares to touch our sisters, his hand will be chopped off with this very sword,” he said while addressing the gathering at one of the Puja Pandals at Kaprol Road in Sitamarhi city.

“We have to make our sisters capable of cutting off their hands and, if needed, me and you all would have to do this. All those evildoers who have ill will against our sisters must be destroyed,” Mr Kumar said.

Mithilesh Kumar appealed to the people to support him in his initiative and encouraged people, especially women, to act against evildoers. The swords were distributed to school- and college-going girls.

Mr Kumar displayed several firearms, swords and other weapons at the venue and worshipped them.

Mithilesh Kumar is a BJP MLA from the Sitamarhi constituency. He made headlines at the start of Navratri when he visited several Durga Puja Pandals and distributed swords.

Worship of weapons is a tradition among a section of the Hindu community during Navratri. 

New Delhi:

The Bharatiya Janata Party said on Sunday it has revoked the suspension of Telangana MLA T Raja Singh following his reply to the show-cause notice issued by the party after a row was triggered by his remarks against Prophet Muhammad.

The MLA was suspended in August and issued a show-cause notice.

“Under suspension, the Central Disciplinary Committee of the party issued a show cause notice to you. This refers to your reply to the show cause notice. Your reply and explanation offered therein have been considered by the committee. Basis your reply, the committee has decided to revoke your suspension forthwith,” Om Pathak, member secretary of the party’s Central Disciplinary Committee, said in a notification.

Earlier, just after his suspension, Singh had told the media that he was confident that the BJP would revoke his suspension soon, and would contest the Telangana Assembly polls from the Goshamahal constituency on the BJP ticket.

He had also ruled out any possibility of joining either Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) or the Congress party.

Telangana is set to witness an intriguing triangular contest between the BRS, Congress, and BJP.

In the previous Assembly elections in 2018, the BRS won 88 of the 119 seats, hogging 47.4 percent of the total vote share. The Congress finished a distant second with 19 seats and a vote share of 28.7 percent.

Polls will be held in Mizoram on November 7, Chhattisgarh on November 7 and November 17, Madhya Pradesh on November 17, Rajasthan on November 25 and Telangana on November 30.

The counting of votes will take place on December 3 in all the states. Of the five states, polling in Chhattisgarh will be held in two phases.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)