A Mumbai government officer sparked calls for her firing after she tweeted a thank you to Mahatma Gandhi’s assassin and called for roads named after the famous civil rights activist to be renamed.
Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer Nidhi Choudhari deleted the controversial comments after creating a wave of outrage.
“What an exceptional celebration of 150th birth anniversary year is going on,” she wrote, the Hindu reports. “High time we remove his face from our currency, his statues from across the world, rename institutions/roads named after him! That would be a real tribute from all of us!”
She added, “ThankU#Godse for 30.01.1948,” in reference to Gandhi’s killer and the date of his murder.
Choudhari, the Deputy Municipal Commissioner in the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), later explained that the tweet was “sarcastic” and “misrepresented.”
Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Jitendra Awhad has called for her to be suspended for her “derogatory” tweet and “glorification” of Godse. “This shouldn’t be tolerated,” he said. Gandhi was once the head of the NCP.
Choudhari said she was “deeply hurt” and saddened by the way her tweet was misrepresented. “I would never insult GandhiJi,” she said, adding he is the “Father of Our Nation.”
She also shared a number of her past tweets expressing her admiration for Gandhi.
I have deleted my tweet of 17.05.2019 w.r.t. GandhiJi because some people misunderstood it
If only they had followed my timeline since 2011 they would’ve understood that I would NEVER even dream of insulting GandhiJi
I bow before him with deepest regard & will do till last breath pic.twitter.com/CSjaKHF9BJ— Nidhi Choudhari🕉☪️✝️☸️ (@nidhichoudhari) May 31, 2019
Once again a few more tweets from past few months, plz read them. I have not created them now or deleted them. You may check today itself & understand how I feel for GandhiJi
My favorite book is My Experiments with Gandhi, my favourite movie is GANDHI
Deeply saddened today😭 pic.twitter.com/OIaxQYcQuI— Nidhi Choudhari🕉☪️✝️☸️ (@nidhichoudhari) June 1, 2019
Choudhari wrote the controversial tweet after Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur, who is now an MP, said Gandhi’s assassin “was a true patriot,” sparking outrage. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi condemned his fellow Hindu nationalist party member for her “utterly disgusting” statements.
Gandhi was killed by Hindu extremist Godse in 1948, who felt Gandhi was pandering to Muslims and was angered by the partition of India in 1947.
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