Sport Minister Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore today refused to be dragged into a row over a tweet by the Athletics Federation of India on sprinter Hima Das' English- speaking skills, saying he had major responsibilities to shoulder and did not comment on everything that people said.
During the Question Hour in the Lok Sabha, when Rathore was responding to supplementaries, Congress' Gaurav Gogoi sought the minister's response to a comment made by the sports body on the English-speaking skills of Das, who won the 400 meters of World Under-20 Championship.
On being pressed for a reply, Rathore said he had major responsibilities to shoulder and did not comment on everything that people say.
Speaker Sumitra Mahajan also sought to support Rathore, saying the minister did not have to respond to everything.
The AFI had last week put its foot in the mouth when it referred to Das' "not so fluent English" after her blazing run, attracting the ire of fans which forced the governing body to issue an apology in chaste Hindi.
#HimaDas speaking to media after her SF win at #iaaftampere2018 @iaaforg Not so fluent in English but she gave her best there too. So proud of u #HimaDas Keep rocking and yeah, try ur best in final! the AFI wrote on its Twitter handle.
Fans took to the social networking site to express their displeasure against the AFI for using what could be construed was insensitive language.
Miffed, fans ridiculed the tweet and said Das was in Finland to showcase her talent in athletics and not her expertise in English language.
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