BJP, Congress trade charges over attack on MPs in Parliament complex

Accuse each other of misbehaving with women MPs

Since last Friday, 209 Members of Parliament — 136 in the Lok Sabha and 73 in the Rajya Sabha — across four sittings debated for a cumulative 32 hours and 51 minutes the “glorious journey of 75 years of the Constitution of India” and spoke of preserving the legacy of B R Ambedkar, who had chaired the document’s drafting committee.

 

On Thursday, several of these MPs, from across the aisles, screamed and shoved one another in the forecourt of Parliament in unprecedented scenes of unruliness.

 

The debate inside the two Houses over those four days was acrimonious but the Treasury and Opposition members had displayed the requisite patience to hear each other out. However, on Thursday things deteriorated with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) as well as Opposition Congress MPs jostling with one another, and alleging that their respective women MPs were ill-treated with the day turning out to be one of the ugliest ever witnessed on Parliament’s premises.

 

The BJP’s Rajya Sabha MP from Nagaland, S Phangnon Konyak, a tribal, alleged that Congress leader Rahul Gandhi misbehaved with her. BJP MPs Pratap Chandra Sarangi and Mukesh Rajput were hospitalised with injuries. The BJP filed a police complaint against Gandhi, accusing him of “physical assault and incitement” and sought that he be booked under sections of attempt to murder.

 

Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge alleged that it was BJP MPs who blocked Congress’ MPs from entering Parliament. He also said BJP MPs misbehaved with the Congress’ woman MPs.

 

Congress MPs were on their way to Parliament after protesting at Ambedkar’s statue on the premises to demand Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s apology for his remarks made on Tuesday in the Rajya Sabha about Ambedkar.

 

Later, at a press conference, Rahul Gandhi said the BJP was accusing him of misbehaviour to distract from the issues that the Congress has raised during the Winter Session, especially demanding Shah’s apology for “insulting” Ambedkar and the issue of a “case being filed against (Gautam) Adani in the US”, on which the BJP did not allow any discussion in Parliament. Kharge said the Congress would launch a nationwide campaign on the “insult” to Ambedkar.

 

At a press conference at the BJP headquarters in the evening, BJP leader and Union Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan accused Rahul Gandhi of a certain type of misconduct that was against Indian traditions and also misbehaving with a tribal woman.

 

Sarangi, 69, BJP’s Balasore MP, was hospitalised and had to be administered stitches for his head injury, while Rajput was also injured in the head. Congress MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said her brother Rahul and the others were protesting peacefully, but were prevented from entering Parliament by BJP MPs carrying “sticks”. The BJP MPs were seen carrying placards pinned to sticks. “BJP MPs stopped, threatened and intimidated me,” Rahul Gandhi said.