Mumbai, Aug 23 (India Today): Giving company to Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitely, who is in the centre of contro-versy over his comments on 'small incidents of rape', is a minister from Maharashtra who made some objectionable com-ments against women in a speech recently.

During an event on Thursday at Tasgaon in Sangli, Indepen-dent MLA from Barshi, Solapur, Dilip Sopal-who was recently inducted into the Maharashtra Cabinet by the Nationalist Con-gress Party-was trying to 'flat-ter' Home Minister R.R. Patil when he made the 'objection-able' remarks.

Recalling an incident, Sopal said that once when actress Rani Mukerji extended her hand to shake hands, Aba (as Patil is known to his family and friends) was in two minds whether to shake hand with the actress or not. "Standing behind Aba, I asked him to go ahead and shake hands. Rani Mukerji is out-dated now, and nobody would doubt your character even if you shake hands with Kareena (Kapoor)," Sopal said.

He then went on compare vineyard cultivation with that of living with a wife suffering from chronic tuberculosis.

Activist lawyer Varsha Desh-pande said, "Such statements show a convoluted mentality towards women, particularly those working in the field of entertainment and media. This is discriminatory and humiliat-ing... What he said goes against the spirit of the oath he took. I believe a FIR should be lodged against him for character vilifi-cation of Rani Mukerji and Kareena," said Deshpande.