The Election Commission on Friday issued a show-cause notice to former high court judge and Bharatiya Janata Party Lok Sabha candidate Abhijit Gangopadhyay for his "improper, injudicious and undignified" remarks against Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
The comments by Bandopadhyay triggered a war of words in poll-bound West Bengal, with TMC claiming that the comments reflect the "misogynist mindset of the BJP," and the BJP claiming that his remarks have been "misconstrued by the TMC."
Gangopadhyay is the fourth politician in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections to have been served a notice for undignified remarks against women.
BJP's Dilip Ghosh and Congress's Supriya Shrinate were censured by the EC after being served notices for their remarks against Mamata Banerjee and Kangana Ranaut respectively.
Randeep Surjewala of the Congress was barred from campaigning for 48 hours for his remarks against BJP's Hema Malini.
The poll panel acted on a complaint by the Trinamool Congress against Gangopadhyay for his remarks against Banerjee while addressing a public meeting held on May 15 in Haldia.
The BJP has fielded Gangopadhyay from Tamluk seat in West Bengal where voting will be held on May 25.
The EC in its notice noted that Gangopadhyay's comment has been found to be "improper, injudicious, beyond dignity in every sense of the term, in bad taste" and prima facie violative of the provisions of the Model Code of Conduct and its advisory to political parties.
The EC has sought a response by 5 pm of May 20.
The notice reminded the former Calcutta High Court judge about its recent advisory which said that political parties and candidates should refrain from any deeds or actions or utterances that may be construed as being repugnant to the honour and dignity of women.
The Trinamool Congress said it would also take recourse to legal action and claimed that his remarks had crossed all limits of decency.
In a purported video which surfaced on Thursday Gangopadhyay was heard wondering about "the amount at which Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is getting sold," triggering a row with the TMC labelling it as BJP's guarantee of disrespecting women, while the saffron party raised doubts about the clip's authenticity.
However, the authenticity of the video couldn't be verified.
TMC leader and West Bengal minister Shashi Panja said, "The remarks made by Gangopadhyay smack of his anti-women traits. This shows that the politics of the BJP has reached a nadir".
"The remarks made by the BJP candidate of Tamluk are sexist in nature and his candidature must be cancelled", she demanded.
Reacting to EC's notice, the BJP said Gangopadhyay would reply to the notice but his remarks had been "misconstrued by the TMC."
"He will give a reply. But the TMC has misconstrued his words. He wanted to point out how Mamata Banerjee is disrespecting women, especially BJP candidate Sandeshkhali Rekha Patra," BJP state spokesperson Samik Bhattacharya said.
The BJP on Thursday questioned the authenticity of the video and dubbed it as a "ploy by the TMC to release fake videos" to malign the saffron camp.
