AK BalanThiruvananthapuram: After drawing flak for his insensitive comments on infant deaths in Attapadi, Kerala minister A.K. Balan has made an appeal not to humiliate him while he welcomed criticisms about his style of functioning.
Kerala's minister for welfare of scheduled castes and scheduled tribes had said 'he was not responsible' for the pregnancies of tribal women, who conceived during the previous UDF regime.
A Kerala minister's misogynist remarks expose deep-rooted prejudices
The comment made in the assembly invited a flurry of criticisms, following which Balan took to Facebook to clarify his statement. He said in the FB post that he was being misquoted by the social media and that the people at Attapadi know him too well to be influenced by such reports.
Balan said that while the print and visual media had not initially made an issue about his comments, they followed suit when some online portals showed him in a bad light. He said that he was deliberately misquoted by some vested interests.
Balan alleged that the media hype is aimed at negating the progress that the government has made in the tribal belts in the state. He concluded in his post that it was painful that some friends were taking a stance against him unilaterally, without considering his side of the story.
