Union minister Sushma Swaraj launched a veiled attack on Meira Kumar, the opposition’s presidential candidate, by posting a video of a 2013 Lok Sabha speech in which the former Speaker was seen repeatedly interrupting the then leader of the opposition.
Swaraj had accused the UPA government of corruption in her speech.
“This is how Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar treated the Leader of Opposition,” Swaraj tweeted along with a link to the over six-minute-long video of her address in April, 2013.
Swaraj was seen as questioning the neutrality of Kumar, pitted against BJP-led National Democratic Alliance candidate Ram Nath Kovind for the presidential contest.
The external affairs minister also tweeted a link to a newspaper report with the headline “Speaker interrupted Sushma 60 times in 6-min speech.”
Swaraj, as the then leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, had lambasted the Manmohan Singh-led regime on alleged financial scams, calling it “the most corrupt government” since Independence.
The first three minutes of Sushma Swaraj’s speech was peaceful without any interference, but as she proceeded to the later half of her speech where she was pointing out on all the scams that were taking place during the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) regime, things started to heat up in the Lok Sabha. While other MPs started making noises, Kumar interrupted MEA Swaraj several times by saying words like, ‘Alright’, ‘thank you’, ‘okay’, ‘I have to proceed’.
The speaker asked Swaraj to cut her speech short as others would also like to make a speech. Following which, Sushma Swaraj announced that she was walking out.
A section of the opposition was keen on Ms Swaraj being the government’s candidate for Presidential elections, though the minister had nixed the idea. After the government named Mr Kovind, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had even said, “The Office of the President is a key post. Someone of the stature of Pranab Da (Pranab Mukherjee), or even Sushma Swaraj or Advaniji (LK Advani) may have been made the candidate”.
Three days later, Ms Kumar was chosen as the opposition candidate for the President’s post. A former diplomat and later a minister in the UPA government, she had been picked unanimously for the position of the Speaker in 2009.
