On Wednesday too, the House had witnessed a clash between Irani and Mayawati over the same issue.
Advertisement
A day after her fiery, 50-minute-long speech in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Indian parliament, Smriti Irani continued to draw bouquets and brickbats from her fans and opponents respectively on social media.
In the second such protest in less than a week, thousands of students from various universities across the country today took to the streets in the national capital demanding justice for Dalit scholar Rohith Vemula and protesting the JNU crisis. She was critical of the Congress as well for its anti-Dalit policies, but the focus remained the BJP government for its intolerance towards students and University campuses like the Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Suicide by Rohith is not the first and many Dalit students have committed suicide in past including when Congress-led UPA was in power at the Centre, she claimed.
To counter the opposition onslaught, BJP targeted Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi for his “support” to those standing with hanged Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru and said the House has to decide if it stands with those who attacked Parliament or those who laid down their lives defending it.
She blamed it on the RSS agenda against the backward classes. Soon after, several members of the Congress entered the well shouting slogans against the Minister.
She added that as per the laws, the government can increase the strength of the commission, and add a Dalit member, but it has not done this so far, which shows its intentions towards the Scheduled Castes.
“If Modiji does not mend ways then very soon the youth and students will come together to teach him a lesson”, Kejriwal said, adding “I had said earlier, “Modiji students se pange mat lena” (don’t mess with students)”. “The questions have been listed and they have to be answered”, he said.
But BSP members were unrelenting, forcing him to adjourn the House for 10 minutes. “Nobody can subscribe to this ideology and least of all should Congress party subscribe to this ideology”, Jaitley said, intervening in the debate. Irani insisted with her reference, saying it was imperative to counter the charge levelled against her. Responding to objections, Deputy Chairman PK Kurian said she has authenticated what she had said.
“As BSP members kept shouting anti-government slogans, Naqvi said “(this is) is a frustrated agenda”. I also informed the VC immediately.
And then Mayawati pointed out that Irani had pledged in the House two days ago to chop off her own head and present it at the former’s feet if her clarifications were not satisfactory. Instead, his body was used as a political tool.
Advertisement
When reminded by a member that her seniors in the House on both sides had advised her against doing so, the minister said she didn’t want lessons from a man on how she should conduct herself. Many saw her as a “haughty” minister and some had even written off her chances of rising in the party hierarchy.
