LUCKNOW:

seat in Deoria, Suresh Tewari found himself in the midst of the controversy following his remark that people should refrain buying vegetable from Muslim vendors.

In a video that has gone viral, Tewari can be heard telling people that Muslim vendors contaminate the vegetable with their saliva potentially increasing the possibility of

getting spread.

Speaking to TOI, Tewari said that he had gone to Barhaj last week to attend a meeting in Nagar Palika Parishad office where some people lodged a complaint of there being reports that Muslim vendors contaminating vegetable with their saliva. "My remark was in response to the people’s complaint. I told them that they should stop buying vegetables from Muslim vendors if they were putting their saliva. There was nothing wrong in what I said," he said.

Tewari denied that government officials were present when she made the statement. "Just a member of the municipality was present in the verandah of the office where the meeting was called," he said.

The legislator said that he had just given his opinion and it was up to people to decide from whom vegetables need to be purchased. He said that everyone saw how there was a spurt in the corona cases following Markaz of

in Delhi's

.

BJP spokesperson, Hero Bajpai said that the party would assess the whole incident before taking any decision or action against the legislator.