New Delhi: After a week-long deadlock amid demands by the Congress for a discussion on American prosecutors’ indictment of Adani Group, Parliament resumed Tuesday only to witness pushback for Modi government on the Adani issue and remarks on Indira Gandhi.
Earlier in the day, opposition parties held demonstrations on the premises to demand a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) probe into allegations levelled against the Adani Group in the indictment. Later, during a discussion on The Banking Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2024, Gaurav Gogoi, deputy leader of the Congress in the Lok Sabha, asked the Treasury Benches: “Why is the government so protective of Adani?”
“Adani is not paying your salary, it is paid by the people of India,” he remarked.
Gogoi added that PM Narendra Modi ‘mocked’ Indians with demonetisation, asking if the government was aware that “many women had to sell off their mangalsutras” as a result.
He then attacked the government for the Indian Rupee falling to an all-time low of 84.76 against the US dollar in early trade Tuesday. He also said that the CBI and ED are ‘busy targeting’ opposition leaders but could not stop fugitive businessmen fleeing the country.
Raising a point of order, BJP MP Nishikant Dubey asked the Chair why Gogoi was being allowed to speak outside the ambit of the bill under discussion. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju, too, accused the Opposition of bringing down the level of discussion.
“Parliament has decorum. Please don’t downgrade it. One-sided dadagiri (bullying) will not fly. Please don’t make Parliament into tamasha (theatre). You are attacking PM and some businessman, it is outside the contours of the bill; please speak on the bill,” he said.
BJP MP Sambit Patra responded to the Opposition by invoking the 1971 Nagarwala scandal, which led to protest from the Opposition and necessitated an intervention by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. Referring to the scandal, Patra said this system of ‘phone banking’ continued during the UPA era which led to a rise in non-performing assets (NPAs).
“When Vajpayee government came in, NPAs in the banking sector were at 16 percent, by the end of the term, it was 7.8 percent. But during UPA it rose to 12.3 percent,” he said.
However, DMK MP A. Raja objected to Patra using former PM Indira Gandhi’s name in the context of the Nagarwala scandal, and asked whether this came in the scope of the bill.
“Patra has crossed all limits. Indira Gandhi was a martyr, who won the war against Pakistan. Even Vajpayee, after the Pakistan war, called her Durga,” remarked Congress MP K.C. Venugopal.
Sitharaman responded by saying that the claim Vajpayee referred to Indira as “Durga” is “contentious”. “So, I appeal to the Chair to remove that part [from the record],” she said—to which Speaker Om Birla agreed.
When Sitharaman rose to speak, opposition MPs also alleged she used a ‘derogatory’ term for Gogoi, to which she said her Hindi is not good and that she never used such a term. Sitharaman, in turn, accused the DMK of ‘mocking’ those in Tamil Nadu who learn Hindi.
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