Patna: Remarks by TMC MP from Bardhaman-Durgapur Kirti Jha Azad that he would never visit the Ram temple in Ayodhya because of the way Lord Ram treated Goddess Sita after her ‘agnipariksha’, triggered a controversy in the state on Wednesday.BJP spokesperson and former MLA Prem Ranjan Patel called him a ‘nastik’ (atheist) who had forgotten the ‘sanatani’ tradition.In Delhi, when reporters reminded him that former UP chief minister and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav had announced plans to visit the Ram temple in Ayodhya, Kirti said, “I will never go there, because Lord Ram abandoned his wife even after she had passed the agni pariksha.”“I belong to the birthplace of Maa Sita. She was the daughter of Mithila. Maa Sita is my mother. For every person belonging to Mithila, Maa Sita is mother,” he said. “He sent her away with two innocent children, despite her passing the ‘agnipariksha’. What should I tell children about the episode?”Azad was a member of the Indian cricket team that won the World Cup in 1983. He later joined the BJP and represented Bihar’s Darbhanga Lok Sabha constituency in 1999, 2009 and 2014. However, he was expelled from the party following a fallout with former Union finance minister Arun Jaitley. After a stint in the Congress, he joined the TMC and was elected to the Lok Sabha from Bardhaman-Durgapur in West Bengal in 2024.Referring to his family’s religious beliefs, Kirti said, “My father, former CM of Bihar, was a devotee of Durga and I am a devotee of Kali. There are crores of deities in the country. I worship Maa Kali, and Kali is my Goddess.”“I visit Kali Kamakhya, Dakshina Kali, Kalighat and the Kali temple at Delhi. Does all that mean that I am not a Hindu?” he asked.