Bharatiya Janata Party legislator Surendra Singh on Sunday said Muslims men who have many wives and children exhibit an “animalistic tendency”, ANI reported.

“In the Muslim religion, you know that people keep 50 wives and give birth to 1050 children,” BJP MLA from Ballia in Uttar Pradesh said. “This is not a tradition but an animalistic tendency. In society, giving birth to only two to four children is normal.”

Singh is known for making controversial and divisive remarks.

In March, he had compared dancer Sapna Chaudhary to Congress leader Sonia Gandhi, and said that both women have the same profession amid reports that Chaudhury would join Congress. “Rahul’s mother was also in the same profession in Italy and his father made her his own,” Singh had said. “He [Rahul Gandhi] should also take the family tradition forward and make Sapna his own.”

In January, he had compared Congress leader Rahul Gandhi to Ravana and his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra to Surpanakha. He had also referred to Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s appointment as general secretary of Congress in Uttar Pradesh as “a joke”.

He had also accused Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati of “murdering a woman’s dignity” by joining hands with Samajwadi Party before the Lok Sabha elections. “For power, Mayawati has done what no person who values his or her dignity would do... she has embraced those who had attacked her and by doing so she has murdered a woman’s dignity,” he had said.

Last year, Singh had advocated that children are a gift from god and every Hindu should have at least five – two for the man, two for the woman and one surplus.