The Congress on Tuesday demanded that Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan be booked after a video purportedly showing him hitting a man surfaced, PTI reported. Bharatiya Janata Party leader Hitesh Bajpai dismissed the incident as a knee-jerk reaction to the man stepping on the chief minister’s foot. Chouhan’s office, however, is yet to comment on the developments.

On Monday, Chouhan held a BJP campaign rally in the state’s Dhar district in the run up to the state civic elections. The man being slapped in the video is believed to be a security guard.

Congress described the video as an example of Chouhan’s frustration as he was “blinded by power”. “We demand that Chouhan be booked for hitting his security man under Section 353 (assault to deter a public servant from performing his duty) of IPC,” Leader of Opposition in the state Assembly Ajay Singh said.

While the chief minister’s public relations officer is yet to comment, Bajpai alleged that the guard had stepped on Chouhan’s foot twice while the chief minister was in a huge crowd. “In an immediate human or knee-jerk reaction, Chouhan only removed him to protect himself and the action was never intended to hurt anyone with any ill-intention,” Bajpai told PTI.