Patna: Jharkhand chief minister Raghubar Das on Sunday became the latest BJP leader to take liberties with history when he declared that Mahatma Gandhi conducted the salt satyagraha (mass civil disobedience) from "Chauparan".

Das was referring to the glory of Bihar at a programme organised here by the Teli Sahu Samaj, an organisation of people from the Teli community to which he belongs.

" Isi dharti se rashtra pita Mahatma Gandhi ne Chauparan ki dharti se namak satyagraha andolan kiya (From this land, Father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi had conducted his salt satyagraha)," Das said.

Chauparan is a place near Hazaribagh in present-day Jharkhand. Champaran, which has a similar sounding name, is located in Bihar.

Gandhi had carried out the salt satyagraha, famous as the Dandi march, by walking from Sabarmati in Ahmedabad to the coastal village of Dandi in Gujarat in 1930 and breaking the British colonial government's law introducing tax on salt production.

Bihar, however, has a special place in the history of Mahatma Gandhi and the freedom struggle. Gandhi had visited Champaran in 1917 and taken up the cause of farmers there who were forced to cultivate indigo. It was his first experiment with mass civil disobedience after returning to India from South Africa.

Last year, the Bihar government had organised a series of programmes to mark the centenary of the Champaran satyagraha. The Centre had also provided funds to the state to develop places related to the movement.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had visited Champaran in April this year to take part in the concluding function, and had addressed sanitation volunteers.

Reacting to Das's comment, Congress MLA from Kadwa Shakeel Ahmed Khan said: "What can one expect from people who have no knowledge of history?"