The ‘one big issue’ is that the LoP and the entire Opposition were not allowed to speak on the President's Address, says the Congress leader
NEW DELHI – Congress leader and Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, on Monday upped the ante in his standoff with the Narendra Modi government. Party sources claimed that the Opposition would submit a notice to move a resolution seeking the removal of Speaker Om Birla and tasked some party managers to collect signatures.
Outlining the Opposition’s objections, Gandhi said in a tweet: the “story started a few days ago” when the issue of former army chief General MM Naravane’s book emerged and the government “stalled the House” as they did not want him to raise it.
He said the “one big issue” is that the LoP and the entire Opposition were not allowed to speak on the President’s Address.
“First, they said I could not quote from a book. Then I clarified that I was not quoting a book but a magazine. After that, they said I could not quote a magazine either. When I said I would speak about the issue without quoting anything, they still did not allow me to speak. Defence Minister (Rajnath Singh) also falsely claimed that the book had not been published. In fact, the book has been published, and we even have a copy,” Gandhi said in his tweet.
Without taking Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Nishikant Dubey’s name, he said the second issue is that one of their MPs, quoting multiple books, spoke “very vile stuff” and it was allowed.
“We don’t like the fact that they can say whatever they want, whenever they want, and the Opposition cannot. The third issue is the suspension of our MPs. The final issue, which we are very disturbed about, is this idea that has been floated that MPs were going to threaten the Prime Minister. There’s no question of that,” he said.
“The fact is clear: the Prime Minister did not come to the House not because of the members, but because of what I was saying. He remains afraid because he cannot face the truth. There is no question of any Opposition member attacking the Prime Minister. If anyone had actually made such a threat, an FIR should be filed immediately and that person should be arrested. Why has that not been done?” he asked.
The Leader of the Opposition said in his personal view the government was afraid of a debate. “The Prime Minister did not come to the House because he was afraid of what we were going to say, and even of being presented with Mr Naravane’s book as a first step. I believe the government is also worried about a Budget debate, because issues such as the US deal – how it was done, what its consequences are, and its impact on our farmers – will be raised, and the government does not want that discussion to take place,” he concluded. – With inputs from Agencies
