Union Minister Anantkumar Hegde on Friday came out openly backing Nathuram Godse, notwithstanding BJP's condemnation of Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur calling Mahatma Gandhi's assassin Nathuram Godse a "true patriot".
However, with his remarks attracting attention, he later deleted the tweet. "My Twitter account has been breached twice in the past one week and certain tweets have been posted on my timeline which has been discarded and deleted. Regret the posts attributed to me," he said in a fresh tweet.
In the earlier tweet, Hegde, known to courting controversies, was quoted as saying he felt that these debates give "good scope for the condemned to be heard upon."
"Am glad that 7 decades later today's generation debates in a changed perceptional environment and gives good scope for the condemned to be heard upon. #NathuramGodse would have finally felt happy with this debate," the tweet said.
After deleting his tweet, Hedge wrote, "My account was hacked since yesterday. There is no question of justifying Gandhi ji's murder. There can be no sympathy or justification of Gandhi ji's murder. We all have full respect for Gandhi ji's contribution to the nation."
On Friday, BJP's Bhopal candidate, Thakur, created a huge controversy by calling Godse a true patriot, a comment from which her party distanced itself and strongly condemned it. It asked her to publicly apologise for it which she first refused but later complied. She said she did not want to hurt anyone and if anyone felt hurt by her statement she apologised for it.
Not new to controversies, Hegde, in January earlier this year, had said that Shah Jahan bought the Taj Mahal from King Jayasimha, who had actually constructed a Shiv temple--Tejo Mahalaya.
At the same event, he also said that "if a Hindu girl is touched by a hand, then that hand should not exist."
Last year, Hegde had hit out at secular intellectuals, saying the latter does not have an understanding of the difference between a living human being and a dead body.
On Friday, Hegde also attacked on Rahul Gandhi after the Congress president posted a meme on social media introducing the word 'Modilie'.
"This m***n Rahul Gandhi is hell bent on proving himself that he is one of his own kind of international idiotic skill master and hence the horizons have extended beyond the boundaries. No one can prevent his growth....Amazing," Hegde tweeted.