There was drama, and broken glass and bandages, Tuesday – courtesy Trinamool MP Kalyan Banerjee – as a joint parliamentary committee met to study amendments to the Waqf Board Bill.
The energetic Mr Banerjee – who made headlines December after mimicking Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar, as opposition MPs protested on Parliament’s steps – slammed a glass bottle on the table while arguing with Abhijit Gangopadhyay, a BJP MP and ex judge of the Calcutta High Court.
Mr Banerjee injured his right hand and had to be given first aid; he was escorted, by Aam Aadmi Party MP Sanjay Singh and AIMIM MP and chief Asaduddin Owaisi, to the Parliament’s medical centre and treated for a 1.5-centimetre laceration on his right thumb and a cut on his little finger.
Visuals shared by news agency PTI showed Mr Banerjee ambling returning from the doctor, with Mr Singh and Mr Owaisi flanking him, and the Trinamool leader being fed soup by a staffer.
The note from the doctor on duty at the medical centre inside the Parliament complex.
Sources told NDTV a ‘scuffle’ broke out during a presentation on the Waqf Bill and Odisha.
Mr Banerjee was apparently speaking out of turn; he was determined to make a point as Mr Gangopadhyay was speaking, but the BJP MP was equally determined to not concede.
#WATCH | Delhi: Meeting of the JPC (Joint Parliamentary Committee) on the Waqf Bill begins at the Parliament Annexe. It was halted briefly after a scuffle broke out during the meeting.
According to eyewitnesses to the incident, TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee picked up a glass water… pic.twitter.com/vTR7xMwOb5
— ANI (@ANI) October 22, 2024
A spat broke out and both MPs began using unparliamentary language, sources said.
It was then that an incensed Mr Banerjee then slammed the glass bottle on the table.
The Waqf (Amendment) Bill was tabled in Parliament in August and, amid furious protests from opposition MPs, sent to the joint committee for further study.
Back in August, in the feisty exchange that followed the proposals being tabled, the Congress called it a “draconian” measure, an “attack on the federal system”, and a violation of fundamental rights.
With input from agencies
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