Hard faultlines in House over Delhi riots

Among the speakers from the ruling BJP were New Delhi MP Meenakshi Lekhi, Bangalore South MP Tejasvi Surya and Paschim Champaran MP Sanjay Jaiswal, among others.

Participating in the debate, Lekhi claimed that police could not act against BJP leaders for their speeches, as then they would have to act against “provocative statements” by Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and Aam Aadmi Party leader Amanatullah Khan as well and invite charges of curtailing freedom of expression.

Contrary to what the Opposition claimed, Lekhi said, the situation had been brought under control within 36 hours because of intervention of the Home Ministry.

Accusing the Opposition of using “lies as a weapon” and “spreading hate”, Lekhi referred to alleged seizures of stones and petrol bombs from an AAP councillor’s residence.

“The way an (IB) officer was killed, only a fundamentalist could do that. Who have been supporting these fundamentalists? …women from the minority community indulged in acid attack. … A majority community school was burnt down but the minority community school was left alone. …properties of minorities have been left alone but those of the majority have been destroyed,” she said, amid protests by the Opposition.

After the BSP’s Danish Ali objected to her remarks, Speaker Om Birla warned her not to refer to any particular community or caste in the debate.

Responding to Lekhi’s speech, in which she largely blamed the minority community for the riots, TMC’s Sougata Ray said he had never heard a more “biased and communal” speech in his life.

Lekhi also cited figures on communal violence during Congress regimes, saying 243 such incidents occurred under Jawaharlal Nehru’s premiership, 337 under Indira Gandhi and 291 under Rajiv Gandhi.

Surya, while defending the government, accused the Congress of engaging in “a module of riot-engineering”. “Congress chief Sonia Gandhi called for ‘aar-paar ki ladai’, and asked people to come out on the streets when she held a dharna at the Ramlila Maidan. The very next day, innocent Muslim women gathered at Shaheen Bagh and began protesting against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act,” he said, adding, “There is nothing anti-Muslim about the CAA, but everything anti-Hindu about the anti-CAA protests.”

Defending Mishra, he said, “Too much has been spoken repeatedly both inside and outside of this House about an alleged hate speech. What did he say? He gave an ultimatum to the police authorities that if you do not clear it in three days, things will not be under control. Is this a hate speech? I will tell you with all confidence. No jurisdiction and no jurisprudence in any part of the world will consider this hate speech.”

Jaiswal said, “A particular community’s leaders instigate the riots and when their own house starts burning, they begin to play the victim card. They say remove the police for 15 minutes and we will show you your place. They say 15 crore will turn out to be stronger than 10 crore… These are the statements that have instigated the riots.”