By Sushil Kutty
The Narendra Modi government will not let Congress MP Rahul Gandhi to speak in Parliament till he gives in to the government diktat. Forget Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla, he stands no chance against the government. And as for the rest of the BJP, including those who aren’t Members of Parliament, they are sworn to deliver to Prime Minister Narendra Modi not just another Prime Ministerial term, but also the closest look he can have at the Nobel Peace Prize!
Rahul Gandhi in London nearly succeeded in derailing that plan, when in the United Kingdom he let out the widely held notion that democracy in India had gone to the dogs and if things continued to be as they were, the time would come when people would stop believing in the saying “every dog has its day”. Nope, hope has also died in India, and not just throbbing democracy.
According to many BJP “sources”, the Bharatiya Janata Party has convinced the treasury benches that Rahul Gandhi has forfeited the right to speak his mind in the Lok Sabha, to respond to the allegations levelled against him, the most important of which was that he broke a sacred covenant when he spoke his mind in London, which happens to be capital city of the real mother of democracy.
Also, the BJP is pretty sure Rahul Gandhi will not apologise and that suits the BJP and the Modi government fine when compared to giving the floor to the Wayanad Member of Parliament to lay bare the government. So, the insistence that he should “apologise first” and only then speak his mind in the house.
You see, the government and the BJP realized late that they had walked into a trap; that they had willy-nilly got their heads stuck in a cleft stick. That if they did not allow him to speak in Parliament it would prove him right that India’s parliamentary democracy under BJP-rule was dead and the Opposition wasn’t being allowed to speak in Parliament.
Worse, if the mike and the floor, both were given to him, there’s no saying what’s gonna happen next? What all will Rahul say, what all will Rahul demand, and what all will result to the alleged carefully choreographed cover-up woven around Modi-Adani and Hindenburg? What if the real story, the true story, starts unravelling, even as Rahul starts speaking, what if?
So, true to expectations, both houses of Parliament opened to pandemonium and the continuous chaos led to yet another day of adjournments. A repeat of what had happened the day before when “The Gandhi” arrived to “speak his piece”. Rahul Gandhi’s words could prove deadly for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s national and global plans. Rahul Gandhi is no friend of Modi and he wasn’t coming to Parliament straight from a ’Mohabbat ki Dukaan’.
Also, the opposition parties haven’t put a lid on their demand for a JPC investigation on Adani-Hindenburg though allegations were levelled that the “audio” inside the house was muted to still the chaos in both the houses. Appeared like whoever held the microphone was a BJP fan and wanted to prove it to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The Congress tweeted this to let the world know: “The house is mute for PM Modi’s friend.”
Rahul Gandhi, the Congress MP at the centre of the pandemonium, was spotted in the Lok Sabha. And, from the look on his face, and from his gestures, it looked like he was keen to speak his “piece”. But that would do things to the BJP’s peace of mind. It was getting clearer and clearer that the decision to run the house was not in the Speaker’s hand.
The “Rahul Gandhi wants to respond versus apologise first” imbroglio will continue to hold both houses to ransom. The BJP formula is to humiliate Rahul Gandhi by demanding he apologise first and then only give him the recourse to clear the stench of all the allegations levelled against him. This was apparent when Gandhi’s London remarks were labelled “egregious and gravely offensive” by BJP spokesperson Shehzad Poonawala who used to be not long ago a Gandhi family loyalist.
The BJP refrain is that “one family’s ego” is not bigger than the “institution of Parliament”, something which it believes resonates with the people at large. “Rahul has made an egregious & gravely offensive remark against our sovereignty by demanding foreign intervention on foreign soil”, Poonawala tweeted. “You cannot undermine Parliament & then seek its recourse. Pehle Maafi Maango Desh se”.
Behind the bravado and the self-righteousness, however, there’s the question: What if Rahul Gandhi refuses to apologise? What if the Congress repeats all the rotten things about India under Modi that he had highlighted at his London pit-stop? Willy-nilly, without even announcing it, or the rest of the opposition parties agreeing to it, Rahul Gandhi has become the most prominent prime ministerial face of the combined Opposition. And Shehzad Poonawala will not admit it, “Modani-Hindenburg” is becoming the Opposition’s main election plank for 2024.. In 1989 Lok Sabha elections, the opposition, mainly BJP raised the bogey of Bofors against the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and won the elections by defeating the Congress.. After 35 years, can the same game be repeated in 2024 polls but this time by Rajiv’s son Rahul against the BJP prime minister Narendra Modi? (IPA Service)
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