Uttarakhand BJP chief Mahendra Bhatt apologises after students' remarks spark backlash

Uttarakhand’s state unit chief of the BJP, Mahendra Bhatt, found himself in hot water on Sunday after a flurry of posts claimed he had insulted students. The controversy erupted on social media, where a video clip of his remarks was shared, and it quickly drew a sharp rebuke from Congress president Ganesh Godiyal.

In a hurried Facebook post, Bhatt tried to steady the ship. “If anyone’s sentiments were inadvertently hurt by any word or the pronunciation used in my statement yesterday, I regret it and offer my apologies,” he wrote. He added that hurting anyone’s feelings was never his intention. The apology sounded sincere, but the damage had already been done – the opposition was already gearing up for a protest.

Godiyal, who posted on X (formerly Twitter), called Bhatt’s language “abusive” and said the remarks revealed a personal vendetta against students, especially after the recent resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan. He attached a video and warned, “If you don’t apologise, I call upon all the youth and students that from tomorrow, they will stage a dharna protest in front of your house for an indefinite period.” The tone was firm, the stakes high.

This spat is playing out against a broader backdrop of exam‑related unrest in the state. Over the past weeks, the NEET‑UG entrance exam has been under fire for alleged irregularities, and a separate scandal involving the Veer Madho Singh Bhandari Uttarakhand Technical University (UTU) has kept the headlines buzzing.

Police in Dehradun recently arrested an assistant professor, Ashish Kumar Gupta, from Shivalik College of Engineering, accusing him of leaking questions for the B.Tech semester exam in Machine Learning for the Internet of Things. The investigation revealed that several questions matched those previously circulated in a WhatsApp group, prompting the cancellation of two semester exams. Senior Superintendent of Police Pramendra Dobhal said the accused had breached examination confidentiality, filing a case under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita for criminal breach of trust, cheating and conspiracy.

Both the NEET controversy and the UTU paper‑leak have ignited student protests across the state, with many demanding accountability from political leaders and university officials alike. In this charged atmosphere, any perceived slight against the youth quickly becomes a flashpoint.

For Bhatt, the apology may be a step toward cooling tensions, but the Congress has already set the tone for a possible indefinite dharna outside his residence if the matter isn’t resolved to their satisfaction. Whether the gesture will be enough to quell the anger of students and their political allies remains to be seen.

As the story develops, observers are watching closely to see if the apology will defuse the situation or simply add another chapter to a fraught exam season in Uttarakhand.