An opposition state lawmaker apologized Friday for making a rape joke in the Karnataka legislative assembly in southern India.

       “There is a saying that when rape is inevitable, lie down and enjoy it,” lawmaker K.R. Ramesh Kumar said in response to a comment made by Speaker Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri about Kageri’s helplessness to impose order in the state assembly. The speaker and other lawmakers laughed at Kumar’s joke.

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       The remark drew condemnation from female lawmakers from Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party, while Kumar’s Congress Party said his comment was “insensitive.”

       “If it hurts the sentiments of women I have no problem in apologizing,” Kumar said, according to the Times of India. “I apologize from the bottom of my heart.”

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       On Friday, the speaker of the state assembly rejected requests by female lawmakers to comment on the issue, because Kumar had already said he was sorry, according to the BBC.

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       “We all respect women, and we strive to ensure that the respect for the woman is not diluted,” Kageri said. “I don’t think there is need to raise the issue and create a controversy.”

       This is not the first time Kumar has been in the spotlight for remarks that were seen as sexist.

       “I got raped once. But like every rape victim, I am being made to feel like I was raped multiple times,” he said in 2019 when he was assembly speaker, regarding corruption allegations raised against him, the BBC reported. He apologized the next day.

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       More than 28,000 cases of alleged rape against women were reported in 2020 in India, according to the country’s National Crime Records Bureau, CNN reported. However, experts believe the actual figure is much higher, because not all rape victims report it to authorities.

       The issue of violence against women in India drew wide attention when a 23-year-old student was gang-raped and beaten on a bus in Delhi in 2012. She later died of her injuries. The case prompted outrage around the world and sparked several protests in India. Four men were executed six years after being convicted, following unsuccessful appeals.

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