BJP responds firmly to Vemula, JNU charges
If the opposition parties had thought that they would get the better of the Narendra Modi Government during the debate in Parliament on the Rohith Vemula suicide and the Jawaharlal Nehru University issues, they were in for a shock. Not only was the Treasury Bench combative but it also left the Opposition squirming. Union Minister for Human Resource Development Smriti Irani, who was the target of the attack, turned the tables on the Congress-left in the lok Sabha, while Union Minister for Finance Arun Jaitley and she teamed up in the Rajya Sabha to counter the Opposition's charge of Government complicity in the incidents that continue to unfold. Realising that it had given free space to Ms Irani in the lower House with its vice president Rahul Gandhi walking out when she began her speech, senior Congress leaders were conspicuous by their presence in the Rajya Sabha and repeatedly interrupted the Minister as she bared one fact after the other, embarrassing not just them but also the Communist Party of India (Marxist). Having been pushed to the back foot, the Opposition turned obstinate, demanding that Ms Irani “apologise” for her controversial remarks. It's strange that the Congress and the rest of the opposition parties should be objecting to statements that the Minister has made not of her own but read out from documents, whether it be on the medical response to Vemula's incident, the deceased student's opinion on the kind of politics that the left (and he mentioned Mr Sitaram Yechury in an online post which the Minister read out in the Rajya Sabha) has played, or the derogatory references made in a pamphlet circulated in the university campus to a deity of the majority community. She also referred to a report of the JNU authorities that exposed the lie being peddled by the Opposition on the shocking incidents in the university campus earlier this month. It is understandable that the Congress and the left especially, since they have the most to answer for their thoughtless intervention which sought to add fuel to fire on a sensitive issue, are looking for ways to digress and deflect attention. And, with Mr Jaitley chipping in with his hitting-on-the-nail remark that “hate speech is not freedom of expression”, there was little left for the Opposition but to raise irrelevant objections. Opposition leaders had demanded a debate on the issues, and they got it. Now, if they have emerged in poor light, they must introspect.
The Opposition must realise that it has lost the battle of perception on the JNU matter and over-played Vemula's suicide case. While its leaders are now at pains to underline that they do not endorse the ‘break-India’ slogans, they did not earlier condemn such remarks with the deserved vehemence. While they visited the JNU campus and empathised with protesting students, they did not speak out on the need to bring the culprits to book or exhort the students to cooperate with law enforcement agencies. What they have been saying in Parliament or in television studios is very different from the rabble-rousing they did during their visits to the university. People understand such double-speak and will not be misled by the side issues these leaders raise — such as the Government's supposed drive to impose an RSS agenda or stifle dissent.