Ruling party BJP and Opposition members engaged in a verbal duel on Wednesday leading to adjournments of Parliament over the BJP MP Anurag Thakur’s remarks a day earlier in the Lok Sabha during his attack on Congress MP and Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi when the former stated “whose caste is not known talks about caste census”.

While Congress has moved a Privilege Motion against Thakur and the Prime Minister claiming that Narendra Modi encouraged a “serious breach of parliamentary privilege” by sharing Thakur’s speech on social media, Opposition MPs slammed Thakur’s speech as an insult to Dalits, Adivasis and OBCs.

As the row erupted in Parliament, the Congress said the Gandhi family’s caste is martyrdom but the BJP-RSS will never understand that. Upon protests from the Opposition benches, the Chair, Jagadambika Pal, assured MPs that the comments will be expunged, he said.

The BJP flayed the Congress for escalating the caste row and said what’s wrong in asking the Leader of Opposition’s caste when he can ask about the castes of others, including the Government officials, judges and even journalists.

In the same vein, however, the ruling party clarified that Anurag did not ask about Rahul’s caste while speaking on the Union Budget in the Lok Sabha and wondered why the Leader of Opposition took an offence and called it an insult to him when none of the other members raised any objection to the former Union Minister’s remarks.

Congress MP Charanjit Singh Channi submitted a notice to move a Privilege Motion against Modi for having posted on social media a video that allegedly contained portions of remarks made by Anurag that were expunged from the proceedings of the House by the Chair. Channi, a Dalit MP of the Congress in the Lok Sabha, submitted a notice to Speaker Om Birla seeking to move a Privilege Motion under Rule 222 of the Rules of Procedure against the Prime Minister.

Samajwadi Party MP Dharmendra Yadav said his party has been saying BJP people have no place in their hearts for SCs, STs, OBCs and Muslims. RJD’s Manoj Jha said Thakur had given proof of his feudal mindset.