Jyotiraditya Scindia was speaking in Lok Sabha during the no-confidence debate
Union Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia today tore into the Opposition, mocking the INDIA bloc and saying those who brought the no-confidence motion do not have confidence in it.
He also responded to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi's verbal attacks on Prime Minister Narendra Modi yesterday. "Yesterday, Rahul Gandhi said that for the Prime Minister, Manipur is not a part of India. This Prime Minister has connected the Northeast with the world, he has a close relationship with the Northeast. The ideology of seeing India divided is yours, not ours," said Mr Scindia, a former Congress leader known to be close to Mr Gandhi.
"I have spent 20 years in Parliament, but I have never seen something like this. The man on country's highest post, the Prime Minister who resides in the hearts of 140 crore Indians, the words used for him by the Opposition. I believe they will have to apologise before the people of the country, if not before Parliament," he said in Lok Sabha during the debate on the no-confidence motion against Narendra Modi government.
"This no-confidence motion is not about Manipur, it is a pretext under which they are tying to bake their political cakes. The Prime Minister made a sensitive statement on the Manipur situation outside Parliament, but they are stubborn that he must speak inside the House," the Civil Aviation Minister said.
Home Minister Amit Shah, he said, kept saying that he was ready for a discussion, but the Opposition disrupted Parliament proceedings for 17 days.
Mr Scindia questioned why former Prime Ministers PV Narasimha Rao and Dr Manmohan Singh "took a vow of silence" during earlier incidents of violence in Manipur in 1993 and 2011, respectively. "If this is not two-faced politics, politics of convenience, what is?"
Taking a swipe at RJD MP Manoj Kumar Jha, he said, "In I.N.D.I.A, there is a professor who talks about morality and values, but his party set records in corruption. This is their character," he said.
As Opposition MPs started staging a walkout in protest, Mr Scindia said, "The people of the country have shown them the way out, now they are exiting Parliament too."
He also took a dig at AAP, which was born out of the anti-corruption movement during the UPA regime, for tying up with the Congress. He said Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, Congress leader in Lok Sabha, accused Trinamool Congress of political violence and corruption in West Bengal. "Today, the Congress, Trinamool and Left have joined hands. This is their reality," he said.
He also took a swipe at Lalu Prasad Yadav's RJD and Nitish Kumar's JDU coming together. "They talk of saving the Constitution, they must first say if they can save their ideals," he said, adding, "Their hearts don't meet, their parties have united."