Thiruvananthapuram, June 19: Kerala Congress President Mullappally Ramachandran on Wednesday referred State Health Minister KK Shailaja as "COVID queen" and "Nipah Princess". The Congress leader made this remark while inaugurating one-day fasting protest in Trivandrum by opposition leader Ramesh Chennithala, The News Minute reported.

According to the report, Ramachandran said that Shailaja "is trying to get the label of COVID Rani (COVID queen), had earlier been in a competition to get the name of Nipah Rajakumari (Nipah Princess).” Catch Breaking News and All Updates Related to COVID-19 Pandemic Here.

Kerala Congress Chief Calls State Health Minister ‘Covid Queen’, ‘Nipah Princess’:

Several netizens criticised Ramachandran's statement on the Health Minister. "Mullappally Ramachandran (The PCC president of Kerala) must apologize for making anti-women comments against our health Minister KK Shailaja teacher," a user wrote.

Twitter Reaction:

Another user tweeted: "While the World calls her 'Corona Slayer', @MullappallyR is calling her 'Nipah Princess' and 'Corona Queen'. Such a crass way of robbing her of her credits.Just goes to show how deeply misogyny and sexism is ingrained in Male politicians."

Twitter Reaction:

In March, Congress Ramesh Chennithala had said that Health Minister Shailaja is driven by "media mania" for her daily press conferences on COVID-19.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jun 19, 2020 06:39 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).