
NEW DELHI: A group of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MPs on Monday submitted a breach of parliamentary privilege notice against Sonia Gandhi, accusing her of using "derogatory and slanderous words" to describe President Droupadi Murmu during her address to a joint session of Parliament last week.
Led by BJP leader and former Union Minister Faggan Singh Kulaste, the BJP MPs, who belong to tribal communities from across the country, have called for disciplinary action from the Rajya Sabha Chairman and Lok Sabha Speaker against both Sonia Gandhi and Bihar MP Pappu Yadav for their remarks, which they argued had “demeaned the dignity of the office of the President”.
Speaking to reporters about the breach of parliamentary privilege notice, Union Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Kiren Rijiju on Monday said that MPs from tribal communities had taken Sonia Gandhi's remark about President Droupadi Murmu seriously and had submitted a memorandum to Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar.
He added that the BJP MPs had also submitted a notice to the Lok Sabha Speaker against Pappu Yadav, who is an independent MP from Bihar’s Purnia, for describing the President’s address to the joint sitting of both Houses as reading a "love letter".
Rijiju further stated that the BJP MPs had urged the Rajya Sabha Chairman to take action against Sonia Gandhi for using terms like "poor thing" in reference to the President. Faggan Singh Kulaste, after submitting memorandums to both the Lok Sabha Speaker and the Rajya Sabha Chairman, told the media in Parliament that they had demanded an inquiry into the remarks made by both Sonia Gandhi and Pappu Yadav, which they claimed sought to "lower the dignity of the highest office" in the country.
In their notice, the BJP MPs expressed their “deep dismay over the unparliamentry, derogatory, and demeaning remarks recently made by Sonia Gandhi, Member of Parliament (Rajya Sabha), about the President of India, which require serious consideration and disciplinary action”.
They further alleged, “This statement appears to demean the stature and dignity of the President of India, the highest Constitutional authority in our nation.” The MPs also cited the Parliamentary Ethics and Code of Conduct, which prohibits members from making defamatory remarks against others, particularly those involving the President of India, especially within the premises of Parliament. They described the remarks as a "clear manifestation of the elitist and anti-tribal mindset" of Sonia Gandhi, accusing her of failing to understand the struggles of the tribal poor.
It may be recalled that following President Murmu's address to Parliament on the first day of the ongoing Budget session on Friday, Sonia Gandhi, when asked by the media to comment on the President's address, allegedly remarked on her apparent exhaustion, saying, "...by the end she could hardly speak, the poor thing.”
The President's Secretariat subsequently issued a statement calling it "unfortunate" and entirely "avoidable". The Secretariat further stated that the remarks were "in poor taste" and “hurt the dignity of the high office”.