Finance Minister Arun Jaitley Vs Sitaram Yechury As #RajyaSabha Debates #JNU, #Nationalism

#NewDelhi: #RajyaSabha  #SitaramYechury launched the debate on nationalism and the #JUN controversy today.

Intervening in the debate, Mr #ArunJaitley said, “Nobody disputes when you say the University has to have free thought. There’s an alternate view point; why should this level of intolerance be displayed to this alternate viewpoint?”

He was responding to the speech of Mr Yechury, who began the debate and accused the Modi government of “partisan intervention” in the Jawaharlal Nehru University or JNU row. Students of the university have been arrested on sedition charges over an event where anti-India slogans were raised.

“In the name of that (nationalism) to penalise the University as a whole. That I think is unfortunate,” Mr Yechury said, and added, “You don’t have to teach us patriotism,” attacking Home Minister Rajnath Singh and Education Minister Smriti Irani for their speeches in a similar debate in the Lok Saha yesterday.

Rajnath Singh had ended the Lok Sabha debate by assuring the house that, “No innocent student will be harassed.” He also said, “If slapping of sedition charge was right, the court will uphold it, if it was wrong, the court will quash it. But let the court take a view on it.”

Choking with emotion, Ms Irani made what was seen as the speech of the day. She tore tore into the opposition which has attacked her over Rohith Vemula’s suicide alleging her ministry pressured his university to punish the Dalit scholar days before he killed himself. She accused the opposition of using Rohith’s death as a “political tool” and said, “Don’t turn education a political battleground. Don’t use our children as vote banks.”

The debate was to have begun in the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday afternoon, but the upper house was adjourned for the day as BSP lawmakers shouted slogans, trooped into the well of the House and forced repeated adjournments, attacking Ms Irani and the Modi government over Rohith Vemula’s suicide.

It blew a gaping hole in the agreement between the government and the opposition on ensuring a “disruption-free session.

At a meeting before the session began the Congress-led Opposition said Parliament would function if the government agreed to debate key issues before important legislative work like bringing the Goods and Services Tax bill.

In the Lok Sabha today, Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu will present the Railway Budget.