Washout in Parliament over Manipur violence; BJP sniffs conspiracy
By Our Special Correspondent
New Delhi, July 20: Day one of the Monsoon session of Parliament was washed out after the Opposition gave voice to the popular anger against the viral video of two women walked naked by armed militia in Manipur, with the incident being dated to May 3, when the ethnic violence erupted in the Northeastern state.
Both the Houses of Parliament faced repeated adjournments as the Opposition insisted that Prim Minister Narendra Modi must make a statement in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha. Modi made the statement to the media ahead of the commencement of the Monsoon session in which he sought to suggest that he was angry at the incident. But he at the same time mentioned other states, while asking the state governments to improve upon the law and order situation.
The Opposition was livid at the generalisation of the Manipur ethnic violence by the prime minister. Congress social media department head Supriya Srinate in a video message attack the prime minister for speaking on the issue of Manipur violence for just 30-second, and also for “attempting to distract the attention from the North-eastern state by speaking of the Opposition-ruled states”.
The government, while agreeing for a discussion on the issue of the Manipur violence, had stated that it should be rules-based. This means that the minister concerned (Amit Shah, Union Ministry for Home Affairs) will only reply to the discussion, and not the prime minister. But the Opposition has made it clear that they would go after the prime minister for his “silence for over two months” even while over 100 people have been killed, and thousands have been displaced.
“So the first day of the Monsoon session of Parliament was washed out. This was because the Modi govt did not agree to INDIA’s demand for an immediate discussion on the post-May 3rd situation in Manipur following a statement by the PM INSIDE Parliament. The PM deemed it more appropriate to give a Desh ke Naam Sandesh via the media OUTSIDE Parliament before the two Houses met. This Sandesh itself was completely silent on how and why a humanitarian tragedy was allowed by the so-called double engine sarkar which has all-but-destroyed the delicate social fabric of Manipur,” tweeted Jairam Ramesh, head of the communication department of the Congress.
Meanwhile, the BJP sought to claim conspiracy in the circulation of the video of the two women who were paraded naked in Manipur on May 3. Former Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad in a presser at the BJP headquarters asked: “A question arises in my mind…we are in the month of July and the video of the first week of May surfaces on Twitter…just before the Monsoon session of Parliament.”
About The Author
