The “culture of ethics” of one of India’s leading parties, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), has been called into doubt after a video of a party worker washing the feet of an MP, before drinking the same water, went viral.

Footage shot in Godda, Jharkhand, on Sunday, shows worker Pawan Shah washing BJP MP’s Nishikant Dubey feet before drinking the used water in front of a crowd of onlookers.

The act was apparently in gratitude for the MP financing the construction of a bridge connecting two villages in the constituency.

Dubey had initially shared it on Facebook querying the fuss over someone volunteering to wash his feet. The post has now been deleted, the Times of India reports.

Congress lashed out at the BJP over the incident, questioning the integrity of PM Narendra Modi and party elements like Dubey.

Read more

“The arrogance of the ilk of BJP leaders like Nishikant Dubey who are habitual offenders of insulting others, of breaking the tradition and of self-propelling a God-like status for themselves, is now out in open,” Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala told news agency ANI.

Questioning the party’s purported “culture of ethics”, he called on the PM and BJP president to take action. They said failure to do so would mean people like Dubey are carrying out “inhumane and insulting” practices with the government’s support.

It is the second time in less than two months that Dubey has drawn the ire of his opponents.

At the end of July, he made headlines as he responded to Congress President Rahul Gandhi’s claim that BJP MPs take “two steps back” when they see him for fear he’ll hug them.

Dubey said his fellow party members refrained from embracing him because they would divorce from their wives as “Section 377 hasn’t been scrapped as yet.”

The legislation criminalized sex between people of the same gender before being repealed earlier this month.

Think your friends would be interested? Share this story!