Comment on Akali leader lands Cherie in hot water

Chandigarh: Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's wife Cherie Blair has tripped herself up with her off-the-cuff comments at a school function in a Punjab village and landed in a political controversy.

Young Congress party legislator Sukhpal Singh Khaira on Wednesday shot off a letter to Cherie Blair, objecting to her comments about former Shiromani Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee (SGPC) member and senior Akali Dal leader Jagir Kaur.

Blair, on Tuesday, told a gathering at a government school in Dhilwan village in Punjab's Kapurthala district that Kaur was a "role model" for others.

Khaira wants Blair to know that Kaur is facing a criminal trial for conspiring to murder her own daughter Harpreet in April 2000, for having married a lower caste boy of her own choice.

"Your comments and speech matters a lot to the public and intellectuals here as you have a great social standing and background," stated the letter.

Cherie Blair was in Dhilwan village to inaugurate the renovated building of a government school at the invitation of London-based Non-Resident Indian (NRI) Raj Loomba.