Team News Riveting
New Delhi, August 8
Even as the first day of the debate on the no-trust motion witnessed heated exchanges between the treasury and opposition benches, the Congress party clarified that it was forced to do so to break Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘maun vrat’ (vow of silence) on Manipur.
With the support of the opposition party, the Congress moved the no-confidence motion against the Narendra Modi government with focus on Manipur. Probably, this was the reason why Congress Member of Parliament from North East Gaurav Gogoi started the debate instead of Rahul Gandhi.
Gogoi said the opposition bloc INDIA was forced to bring the no-confidence motion against the government to break Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “vow of silence” on Manipur. He alleged that a government which talks about “one India has created two Manipurs — one living in the hills and the other in the valley”.
He also brushed off the government’s argument that no Prime Ministers have spoken on the Manipur issue after previous instances of violence, pointing out that the BJP’s iconic leader and former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had visited Gujarat during the 2002 communal riots. The Congress MP said there are three reasons why PM Modi is “silent” — “failure of the state government”, “failure of the home department and national security arrangement”, and because he does not want to accept that he made a mistake. “Manipur demands justice… If Manipur is burning, the whole of India is burning,” Mr Gogoi said.
Taking on the opposition members, Union Minister Kiren Rijiju said the Opposition would regret bringing the no-confidence motion because it comes at the “wrong time and the wrong manner”, given India’s current stature in the world. He also questioned how the Congress is flagging Manipur today, since during the days of the UPA government, “We repeatedly begged (then Prime Minister) Manmohan Singh to pay a little attention to the northeast”.
BJP Member of Parliament (MP) from Jharkhand Nishikant Dubey said former Congress chief Sonia Gandhi has only two jobs — ‘Set’ the son and give presents to the son-in-law.
Besides Kiren Rijiju, four ministers including Amit Shah, Nirmala Sitharaman, Smriti Irani and Jyotiraditya Scindia will speak during the debate besides 10 other BJP MPs.
The government asserted that after major violence took place in Manipur in 1993 and 1997, no statement was made in the Parliament in one case and in the other, the junior home minister had given a statement.
The opposition contends that in view of the over 170 deaths, injuries, and displacements of thousands of people since the ethnic violence broke out in May, there is nothing more urgent that can demand the Prime Minister’s attention.
