New Delhi: Opposition leader Mallikarjun Kharge on Wednesday accused the RSS, the ideological mentor of the ruling BJP, of being anti-Constitution as he was surrounded by MPs from the INDIA bloc after they walked out of the Rajya Sabha.
The Congress leader also accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of giving incorrect information in the House.
The MPs of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA), who were leaving the Upper House in the middle of Modi’s response to the debate on the motion of thanks to the President’s speech, gathered at the gate of the old Parliament building, the Samvidhan Sadan.
Besides Kharge, those present included Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and P Chidambaram, Nationalist Congress Party (SP) leader Sharad Pawar, Tiruchi Siva of the DMK, Sagarika Ghose and Sushmita Dev of the Trinamool Congress (TMC), Mahua Maji of Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM), Manoj Jha of Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and Priyanka Chaturvedi of Shiv Sena-UBT.
“We have organised a strike because the prime minister, while responding to the debate on the president’s speech, gave wrong information… It is his habit to lie, mislead people and speak against the truth,” Kharge said.
“When the Prime Minister spoke about the Constitution … I wanted to say that you did not write the Constitution, you were the opponent. I wanted to make it clear who was for the Constitution and who was against it,” he added.
Quoting an article from the RSS mouthpiece “Organiser” dated November 30, 1950, the Congress leader alleged that the organisation was opposing the Constitution and said there was nothing Indian in it.
“They were against the Constitution and rejected it, and now they are talking about protecting it. They have been against the Constitution from the beginning,” he said.
According to Maji, the opposition was the one who organised the strike because the leader of the opposition was not allowed to speak in the House.
“The prime minister made some objectionable remarks against the Congress. Khargeji repeatedly said that he should be allowed to speak. The Speaker did not give him permission. All the opposition leaders demanded that he be allowed but the Speaker ignored them,” the JMM leader said.
“The chairman does not look at the opposition. The leader of the opposition felt offended and so we organised a strike,” she added.
Congress’ Pramod Tiwari said it was a tradition in the House to allow the Leader of the Opposition to speak.
According to Dev, the BJP is showing no respect for the constitutional position of opposition leader.
“A saga of lies in the Prime Minister’s speech in the Rajya Sabha. The Opposition cannot be expected to sit through such a speech without even a chance to intervene,” Dev said in a post on X.
A saga of lies against the @PMOIndia in the Rajya Sabha Temple.
You cannot expect the opposition to sit through such a speech without even being given a single chance to intervene.
The BJP has shown absolutely no respect for the constitutional position of the LOP and continues to be dictatorial towards the…
— Sushmita Dev AITC (@SushmitaDevAITC) July 3, 2024
“The BJP has shown complete disrespect to the constitutional position of the LOP and continues to be dictatorial towards the opposition, which is in the House on mandate and not dependent on the treasury benches,” the TMC leader said.
Led by Congress, the INDIA bloc parties walked out of the Rajya Sabha after Kharge was not allowed to intervene during Modi’s speech.
Speaker Jagdeep Dhankhar ignored Kharge’s requests to allow him to speak, leading to sloganeering by opposition MPs. Modi continued his speech amidst the sloganeering.
This went on for some time, with Kharge repeatedly pleading to be allowed to speak. When permission was not forthcoming, the INDIA bloc MPs walked out of the House.
Published July 3, 2024, 10:55 AM IST
