Venkaiah Naidu sends privilege notice against Rahul Gandhi for 'Jaitlie' tweet to Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan

Congress president Rahul Gandhi has landed in trouble over a tweet in which he referred to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley as “Jaitlie”. A privilege motion against Rahul has been forwarded to Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan.

The privilege motion was served by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Bhupendra Yadav, who accused Rahul of using “derogatory” language against Jaitley, The Indian Express reported. The privilege motion was raised in the Rajya Sabha, and chairman of the Upper House, M Venkaiah Naidu, has referred the matter to the Lok Sabha since Rahul is a member of the Lower House, the report added.

On 27 December 2017, Rahul had tweeted: Dear Mr ‘Jaitlie’ - thank you for reminding India that our prime minister never means what he says or says what he means", in reponse to Jaitley’s statement in Rajya Sabha.

Dear Mr Jaitlie - thank you for reminding India that our PM never means what he says or says what he means. #BJPLies pic.twitter.com/I7n1f07GaX

— Rahul Gandhi (@RahulGandhi) December 27, 2017

Rahul’s remarks was in reference to  Jaitley’s statement after an agreement to end an impasse in the Upper House was reached between the treasury and Opposition benches over Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s remarks against his predecessor Manmohan Singh during the Gujarat Assembly election campaign.

Moving the privilege notice , Yadav had said that, “The members of this House have dignity. The name of the Leader of the House Arun Jaitley has been intentionally published by the Congress president with malafide intentions to defame this House.”

“The way his (Jaitley’s) name has been twisted by the Congress President on his Twitter handle, it comes in the category of (breach of) privilege. There are precedents such as that of NC Chatterjee in 1954,” he said.

During Zero Hour on the last day of the Winter Session, Yadav wanted to know the fate of his privilege notice, to which Naidu replied saying it was under his consideration.

“Your notice is under my consideration. I have already told you, I will be taking action immediately, but it’s not within the purview of Rajya Sabha, finally it has to go to Lok Sabha. I will take necessary decision at the earliest,” the chairman had said.

With inputs from agencies