 "Union HRD Minister Smriti Irani (Photo: PTI)")
If Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati outfoxed the treasury benches and left Human Resource Development (HRD) Minister Smriti Irani seething and speechless in the Rajya Sabha in the afternoon, by evening Irani, a former television actor, employed histrionics with telling impact to make public letters to her from opposition leaders seeking admissions of children of their constituents to government-run central schools.
Irani was replying to a discussion in the Lok Sabha on the situation in the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and the University of Hyderabad. The minister’s attack left many red faced, and not only in the Opposition ranks. Speaker Sumitra Mahajan twice requested Irani to not get “agitated” and seemed to disapprove of the minister crossing the line of political etiquette by making public letters from Opposition leaders. The Speaker reminded Irani that replying to the letters of members of Parliament (MPs), both from her own as well as Opposition parties, was part of the job of a minister.
Parliamentary Affairs Minister M Venkaiah Naidu defended Irani, while Prime Minister Narendra Modi later tweeted the link to the minister’s speech. “Satyameva Jayate. Do hear this speech,” he tweeted.
The HRD minister said she was taking the attack on her “personally” and that she was being attacked for having fought the 2014 Lok Sabha elections against Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi from Amethi. “I will not seek forgiveness for doing my duty… you (Congress members) never wanted to listen to my reply,” she said, as members of the Congress, Left parties and Trinamool Congress staged a walkout.
Irani said she would quit if anybody could prove she saffronised education. “I respect your patriotism, don’t demean mine. I have my idea of India… don’t demean it,” she said. She recounted the anti-India slogans shouted by students on the JNU campus on February 9. Irani said some students observed ‘Mahishasura martyrdom day’ in which Goddess Durga was demeaned. The minister accused the education policy of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government for this state of affairs. On student Rohith Vemula’s suicide, Irani, in a choked voice, said “a mother who gives birth cannot take lives”.
She said a Congress MP had repeatedly written to her to intervene into affairs of the Hyderabad University. The minister copiously quoted from school textbooks to establish how those prescribed during UPA rule were 'anti-Hindu'.
A little later, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said in the Lok Sabha that the government would not allow any innocent students arrested on sedition charges from JNU to be harassed. He also said those who were guilty of violence in Patiala House courts would not be spared, but stood by his claims that JNU students could have terror links.
The day, in the Rajya Sabha, belonged to Mayawati. The BJP had planned to corner a united Opposition for allegedly siding with ‘anti-national’ forces. But, Mayawati outmaneuvered the government by insisting that the issue at the Hyderabad University wasn’t that of nationalism but of injustice to Dalit student Rohith Vemula, and should be discussed separately.
Mayawati wanted to know whether the judicial inquiry committee into the suicide of Vemula had any Dalit representation. Ministers pleaded that the BSP chief’s query would be answered when the HRD Minister replies to the discussion. However, the BSP chief was unmoved and her party members time and again trooped into the well of the House to force repeated adjournments, accusing the government of being “anti-Dalit”. A war of words also ensued between Irani and the BSP chief. Irani said the BSP chief had no right to issue certificate as to which caste be part of the inquiry committee. “Shouting won’t help. Please answer my simple question,” Mayawati said, adding she didn’t want to talk with the PM’s ‘stooges’.
The exchange between the former UP chief minister and Irani also comes in the wake of talks that the BJP might field the latter as a CM candidate in the upcoming Assembly elections in UP. The Congress, which had also demanded a joint discussion on both Hyderabad University and JNU, sensed its opportunity and agreed with the BSP chief. Mayawati, who is preparing for the Uttar Pradesh Assembly election due in early 2017, eventually relented to discuss both the issues together when the House convenes on Thursday but only after having secured a commitment that her queries on the Vemula suicide would be answered.
It wasn’t a coincidence that BJP chief Amit Shah was in Bahraich in Uttar Pradesh on Wednesday to unveil the statue of 11th century warrior Suheldev, a ruler still remembered by the most backward ‘Rajbhar’ community. As legend goes, Suheldev battled and defeated “Muslim invader” Syed Salar Masood Ghazi. By honouring B R Ambedkar and the Rajbhar king, the BJP has been trying to make inroads into what the BSP considers as its support base in UP.
In the Lok Sabha, the Congress demanded the government take up the discussion on Wednesday itself. It was earlier decided that the discussion would be taken up after the Railway Budget on Thursday. Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia accused the government of muzzling the voice of the youth in institutions of higher learning.
Trinamool Congress MP Sugata Bose delivered a passionate speech in which he quoted from the writings and speeches of Rabindranath Tagore, Subhas Chandra Bose, Aurobindo as well as the conception of nationalism in the epics Mahabharata and Ramayana.
He said the Bharatiya Janata Party’s idea of nationalism was of centralised despotism and was “narrow, selfish and arrogant”. He demanded the repeal of the sedition law.
