PATNA (TIP): Bihar’s premier government hospital, the Indira Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences (IGIMS), kicked up a row by asking its new recruits to declare if they were “virgins” or married, but later replaced the word with “unmarried”.

Amid the furore, the Health Minister, sought to explain away the gaffe, saying the dictionary meaning of the word virgin was ‘kunwari’ or unmarried, which was not objectionable. The marital declaration form given to the recruits had asked them to declare whether “he/she was a bachelor/widower/virgin”.

The form also asked male recruits to mention whether they had one wife or more. “After the matter came to my notice, I ordered the word ‘virgin’ be deleted and in its place “unmarried” be used, which is the standard practice,” Health Minister Mangal Pandey said.

Talking to a TV channel, he had said, “I consulted the dictionary for the meaning of virgin and found that in Hindi,it means Kanya, Kunwari or Kanya rashi, which are not objectionable… But in view of the opposition, I got the word deleted and replaced.” Source: PTI