After CM Yogi’s Hanuman was Dalit comment, Dalits offer puja at Hanuman temple in UP

A week after Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath triggered a row by calling Lord Hanuman a Dalit, a group of Dalits offered prayers at a Hanuman temple in Muzaffarnagar on Tuesday, December 4, police said.

Police said they removed the group, led by Dalit Kranti Dal president Deepak Gambhir.

They had also put up a banner of 'Dalit Hanuman Mandir, Hanuman Chowk, Muzaffarnagar' in front of the temple, the officer said.

The group went into the temple, where one of them assumed the role of a priest and started offering prayers, a police officer said.

Last Tuesday, addressing a rally in Rajasthan's Alwar district, Adityanath had said, "Lord Hanuman was a forest dweller, deprived and a Dalit. Bajrang Bali worked to connect all Indian communities together, from north to south and east to west." On Sunday, Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Azad had urged members of the community to take over all Hanuman temples in the country and appoint Dalits as priests there.

On Tuesday, Bahraich BJP MP Savitri Bai Phule joined the row by claiming that Hanuman was "a Dalit and a slave of 'manuwadi' people".

"Lord Hanuman was a Dalit and a slave of 'manuwadi' people. He was a Dalit and a human. He did all for Lord Ram then why he was given a tail and his face was blackened. Why was he made a monkey?," Phule said.