Mallikarjun Kharge on row linked to President oath: 'How was Shinde in 1st row?'

A fresh political row has broken out over Mallikarjun Kharge not getting a proper seat during the President oath event.

Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge on Monday expressed his resentment over the seating at the Presidential oath event, hours after the opposition sent a letter to Rajya Sabha chairman Venkaiah Naidu. The letter underlined the “disrespect” to Kharge, who is the leader of opposition in Rajya Sabha by not giving him a seat “commensurate with the position he holds”.

Mallikarjun Kharge speaks to news agency ANI. ((ANI) )

“We are writing to express our shock and protest at this deliberate disrespect shown to a very senior leader violating the warrant of precedence and not in accordance with protocol courtesies due to him,” said the letter, signed by the National Congress Party’s (NCP) Vandana Chavan, Communist Party of India’s (CPI) Binoy Viswam, Congress’ Mukul Wasnik, Pramod Tiwari and Jairam Ramesh among others.

Dismissing the claims, union Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Pralhad Joshi cited protocol. He said the senior Congress leader was seated in the first row despite the protocol on the LoP sitting in the third row. “When he still complained that it was on the corner, the staff offered to move him to the centre, but he refused,” he was quoted as saying by news agency ANI.

To this Kharge later responded saying: “...As for the protocol, how did Chief Minister Shinde appear in the first row? They make their own people sit in the front. And a recognised opposition leader is simply brushed aside. It is not okay.”

He also spoke against suspension of four Congress MPs amid opposition protests in parliament. “It is not appropriate to suspend someone. The government is intimidating them for putting forth the truth in the parliament. It shows that PM Modi wants to end our democracy.” he said.

Droupadi Murmu took oath earlier in the day as India’s 15th President. She has become country’s first tribal woman president after defeating Yashwant Sinha, the opposition’s candidate.

(With inputs from ANI)