Smriti Irani Expresses her Views in the Budget Session

The budget session of the parliament saw a wave of verbal storm exchanged between the HRD minister and the opposition parties in Lok Sabha. Certain key matters such as the suicide of the Dalit student Rohith Vemula and the ‘anti-national’ row in the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) were discussed threadbare in the session.

Accusations were made against the HRD minister and another MP Bandaru Dattatreya of pressuring the Hyderabad University to punish Rohith Vemula who had attacked the ABVP activist. Smriti Irani absolutely refused to apologise for the same saying that she forced the university to act against Rohith with multiple letters after Bandaru Dattatreya wrote to her. She said,” I did my job and I will not apologise. Communications received from the MPs should be attended to promptly.”

Some highlights of her speech were:

She said that the moment she received the news of Rohith Vemula’s suicide she had called the chief minister of Telengana to make sure that the law and order situation in the state should be under control. She was told,”Sir is busy right now.” She said,” But I have a call record, I even spoke to his daughter.”

She said,” Political parties are busy trying to use the death of a child (Rohith Vemula) as a political weapon. The committee which suspended Dalit Scholar Rohith Vemula was not constituted by our government but by the UPA regime.”