Sonia calls President ‘poor thing’, PM says insulting; Rashtrapati Bhavan: In poor taste

Interacting with the media after the President’s address ended, Sonia said: “Poor lady, the President was getting very tired by the end. She could hardly speak, poor thing.”

Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi, who flanked Sonia, along with sister and Lok Sabha MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, chipped in, calling the speech “boring”.

The President’s Office issued a statement in response. Without naming Sonia, it said the comments were in “poor taste, unfortunate and entirely avoidable”, and suggested that they may be the result of the Congress Rajya Sabha MP not being well acquainted with Hindi.

Addressing a campaign rally in Delhi, Modi called Sonia’s remarks an insult to “all the tribals and poor of the country”. Other senior BJP leaders, including president J P Nadda, also attacked Sonia.

Coming to her mother’s defence, Priyanka said Sonia had “the utmost respect” for the President, and that her remarks had been twisted by the media.

The statement by the Rashtrapati Bhavan said: “While reacting to the media on the Hon’ble President’s Address to Parliament, some prominent leaders of the Congress party have made comments that clearly hurt the dignity of the high office, and therefore are unacceptable. These leaders have said that the President was getting very tired by the end and she could hardly speak. Rashtrapati Bhavan would like to clarify that nothing could be farther from the truth.”

It added: “The President was not tired at any point. Indeed, she has believed that speaking up for the marginalized communities, for women and farmers, as she was doing during the course of her address, can never be tiring. The President’s office believes it might be the case that these leaders have not acquainted themselves with the idiom and discourse in Indian languages such as Hindi, and thus formed a wrong impression. In any case, such comments are in poor taste, unfortunate and entirely avoidable.”

Addressing a poll rally, Modi said: “Droupadi Murmuji hails from a tribal family from the jungles of Odisha and has made her way up from there. Her mother tongue is not Hindi. It is Odiya. Despite (Hindi) not being her mother tongue, she inspired Parliament today in a spectacular manner. But the Congress’s royal family has stooped to insult her. One of the members of the royal family said that the daughter of the tribal society delivered a boring speech. Another member went one step ahead. She called the President a poor thing. Gareeb kaha, cheez kaha, thakee hui kaha (Called her poor, a thing, tired).”

The PM added: “They find the speech of a tribal daughter boring. This is an insult of the 10 crore tribal brothers and sisters of the country. It is an insult to every poor person of the country. The Congress royal family does not like those who come from a humble background. The Congress insults the poor, OBC, Dalit and tribals at every step,” he said.

Nadda said Sonia’s use of “poor thing” to refer to the President was “deeply disrespectful and underscores the Opposition’s continued disregard for the dignity of the highest constitutional office”, and true to “its legacy of disrespect for B R Ambedkar with undignified ease – all for petty political gains”.

“Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incident,” the BJP chief said. “While the President was highlighting the government’s achievements, the Opposition, driven by its feudal mindset, chose instead to mock the empowerment of backward classes and women, a transformation brought about under PM Modi’s leadership.”

Nadda suggested that the Opposition “focus on meaningful discussions in the temple of democracy… instead of repeatedly insulting the highest office in the country”. “They must stop parroting the language of foreign puppet masters while enriching themselves.”

Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said the Opposition is “unable to digest” that a tribal woman has become the President of the country for the first time, and hence trying to project her as weak. Rijiju also sought an apology from Sonia.

Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said: “This (Sonia’s) statement reflects the feudal thinking of the Congress, its arrogance and its frustration with the President, who comes from a Scheduled Tribe community. The Congress’s thinking has always been anti-SC-ST-OBC… Congress leaders cannot tolerate how people from Dalit, deprived and backward communities are occupying the highest positions in the country.”

Speaking at an event to honour tribal communities who participated in the Republic Day parade and festivities, Minister of State for Tribal Affairs Durgadas Uikey said: “No one is big or small, but to comment on someone’s colour, appearance or caste is extremely condemnable. I condemn this (Sonia’s remarks) publicly and appeal to you that when you go back to your villages, you should spread this message and raise this issue till the last person.”

In defence of Sonia, Vadra said: “My mother is a 78-year-old lady. She simply said that ‘The President must have been tired reading such a long speech, poor thing’… She fully respects her. In fact, she has the utmost respect for her, and I think it is unfortunate that this kind of thing is twisted by the media. They (Sonia and Murmu) are both respectable people, and older than us. They are at a certain age now, and it is pretty clear that she (Sonia) meant no disrespect.”

On the BJP demanding an apology from Sonia, the Congress general secretary said: “They should first apologise for the abyss that they have pushed the country into.”

Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge raised the fact that President Murmu had not been present at the inauguration of the new Parliament building. “The Indian National Congress and our leaders can never insult Her Excellency the President or any citizen. This is not our culture. The BJP deliberately kept our current President and previous President (Ram Nath Kovind) away from both the temple of democracy and the Ram Temple (inauguration),” he said.

Kharge linked the row being raised by the BJP over Sonia’s remarks to the tabling of the Economic Survey report Friday, saying it had shown “the mirror of truth” to the Modi government. BJP leaders and a section of the media were twisting Sonia’s remarks to hide the bad state of the economy, the Congress chief said.