LUCKNOW: The educational qualification of Union Textile Minister Smriti Irani remained in the spotlight yet again on Friday as the main opposition party Congress accused her ‘falsifying records’ and submitting contradictory affidavits to the ECI. The party by submitting a memorandum to Election Commission sought Smriti’s disqualification from contesting election.
However, Union Minister Smriti Irani hit back at the Congress over its allegations saying she would continue to work hard for Amethi no matter what its leaders said.
The jinn of ‘degrees’ came back to haunt Smriti Irani as she submitted her affidavit while filing her nomination papers in Amethi on Thursday. Smriti is challenging Congress chief Rahul Gandhi in
his bastion for the second time in these elections. She had contested previous 2014 polls from the same seat.
While filing papers on Thursday, Smriti Irani had claimed she passed secondary school examination in 1991 and senior secondary school examination in 1993. She also mentioned she did not complete her
Bachelor of Commerce (Part-I) — a three-year degree course — from DU’s School of Open Learning in 1994.
In her affidavit this year, Irani has stated that she appeared for the All India Senior School Certificate Examination from Holy Child Auxilium School through the Central Board of Secondary Education
(CBSE) in 1993.
The reason for Friday brouhaha was the discrepancy in her educational qualification
mentioned by her in the affidavit she had filed at the time of 2004 Lok Sabha polls while contesting from Chandni Chowk in Delhi. Then Irani had claimed that she had done her from Delhi University (School of Correspondence) in 1996.
In 2004, she reputedly differed from her present stance. Then she had not only claimed that she had completed her degree in 1996 but also that her subject was arts.
Meanwhile, in her affidavit for 2014 polls, she had stated that her educational qualification as “Bachelor of Commerce Part-1, School of Open Learning (Correspondence), University of Delhi – 1994.”
As she took over Modi’s youngest minister in 2014, she came under fire from Congress
and other opposition parties for not even a being a graduate and taking care of education under HRD ministry.
Row over Irani's educational qualification stretched as far as a case was filed against her over her contrarian claims in her poll affidavits of 2004 and 2014 in 2014. However, she was shifted out of HRD
ministry after a two-year tenure replete with controversies.
Though her lack of a degree does not disqualify her from being an MP or a minister as election norms do not set any educational qualifications to hold office. The opposition, however, flagging out
the “misleading” claims in poll affidavits.
Mocking at the BJP leader, while Congress dubbed her as the serial liar saying: “A new serial is coming— ‘Kyunki Mantri Bhi Kabhi Graduate Thi’,” taking a dig at Irani’s popular TV soap opera in
which she acted before joining politics.
However, retorting to Congress’s spoof on her TV serial, Smriti Irani claimed: "In the past five years, there has not been any disgraceful attack which has not been made against me by the Congress
and its 'chele chapate' (stooges), nor is there any bad word or disrespect which has not been hurled at me."
"I have a message for them... as much as you try, I will work for Amethi against the Congress. No matter what you say, the more you harass me, the harder I'll work," she said, adding that the Congress
supporters were targeting her because she was taking on the 'Namdar' (dynast), referring to Rahul Gandhi.