New Delhi: A day after tendering apology for his alleged derogatory remarks about Odisha and its people, former Supreme Court judge Markandey Katju on Saturday received a flower bouquet and a “get well soon” card from the Delhi Odia Students Association. This was informed by Katju himself through a Facebook post.
Katju in his earlier post had dubbed Odias as “poor” and “humourless” but announced to have changed his opinion on Odias.
After he got ‘get well soon card’ from Odia students, Katju took to Facebook and wrote:
In his initial Facebook post Katju had said: “What is there to write about these (Odiya) poor chaps? Ever since they got a thrashing at the hands of Ashoka in the battle of Kalinga, they have been a dejected lot. Now all they have with them are a lot of pots (Patras), big pots (Mahapatras) and supposedly intelligent kings (Patnaiks).”
Katju’s statement had sparked agitation across the state and people from various section of life demanded apology from him. Besides tendering apology in the Facebook post, the former judge had claimed that he was joking and made the comments in lighter vein. He also appealed to the people of Odisha not to file case against him.