A day after Kalyan Banerjee was seen mimicking and ridiculing Indian Vice-President Jagdeep Dhankhar, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee came to the defence of the Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader on Wednesday (20th December).
Far from condemning Kalyan Banerjee, the TMC supremo squarely blamed Congress scion Rahul Gandhi. “We respect everyone. There is no question of disrespecting anyone. It was a causal, political mockery. Anyway, you would have not known if Rahul ji did not make a video,” Mamata Banerjee was heard telling reporters.
On being asked whether she condones the mockery of Jagdeep Dhankhar, she dodged the question and remarked, “I will only talk about issues about Bengal.”
It must be mentioned that Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress is a member of the I.N.D.I. Alliance propped by the Congress party in the hopes of defeating the Narendra Modi-led-BJP government in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
But she did not think twice before throwing Rahul Gandhi under the bus and protecting her own party member Kalyan Banerjee. Interestingly, it was not Rahul Gandhi who disseminated the video on social media although he was seen videotaping it in his individual capacity.
It was the media that captured Rahul Gandhi, making a video from a different angle, and shared it on their respective channels. Mamata Banerjee mistook the amplification of the ridiculous act of her MP Kalyan Banerjee as Rahul Gandhi’s fault.
In his defence, Rahul Gandhi claimed, “MPs were sitting there, I shot their video. My video is on my phone. The media is showing it…Nobody has said anything.”
The Congress scion, who was seen laughing at the mockery of the Indian Vice-President, tried to deviate the discussion to other political issues.
“150 of our MPs have been thrown out (of the House) but there is no discussion on that in the media. There is no discussion on Adani, no discussion on Rafale, no discussion on unemployment. Our MPs are disheartened and sitting outside. But you are discussing that (mimicry),” he said.