Mimicry row: President Droupadi Murmu expresses dismay, PM Modi dials Jagdeep Dhankhar

Shubhadeep Choudhury

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New Delhi, December 20

The BJP’s attempt to take the moral high ground on the mimicry row got a shot in the arm today with President Droupadi Murmu condemning Opposition MPs involved in the incident.

Video clips of suspended Trinamool Congress MP Kalyan Banerjee mimicking Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar during a protest by Opposition MPs on Tuesday were aired on TV and widely circulated on the social media. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi was seen making a video of Kalyan’s mimicry on his mobile phone.

In a post on X, Murmu wrote, “I was dismayed to see the manner in which our respected Vice-President was humiliated in the Parliament complex. Elected representatives must be free to express themselves, but their expression should be within the norms of dignity and courtesy. That has been the parliamentary tradition we are proud of, and people of India expect them to uphold it.”

VP humiliated

I was dismayed to see the manner in which our respected Vice-President was humiliated in the Parliament complex. — Droupadi Murmu, President

Prime Minister Narendra Modi also called up Dhankhar to say he was deeply pained by the treatment meted out to him by Opposition MPs. Dhankhar, in a post on X, said, “He (Modi) expressed great pain over the abject theatrics of some MPs and that too in the sacred Parliament complex yesterday.”

“He (Modi) told me that he has been at the receiving end of such insults for 20 years, but the fact that it could happen to a constitutional office like the Vice-President and that too in Parliament was unfortunate,” Dhankhar wrote. Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla also met Dhankhar on Wednesday to express his concern. Talking to reporters here today, West Bengal Chief Minister and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee said Kalyan did not mean any disrespect to the Vice-President.

“I have respect for everyone”, Mamata said, adding that had Rahul not recorded Kalyan’s act, people would not have known about it.

Kalyan, however, was excluded from a delegation of MPs who accompanied Mamata during her meeting with PM Modi today to press the demand for releasing central funds for the state.

Hitting back at the BJP, Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh posted on X a clip of PM Modi mimicking Rahul’s wink. “Remember who mimicked whom and that too in the Lok Sabha,” Ramesh wrote.