Speaker chides Sonia over Waqf Bill 'bulldozer' remark, Cong sees red

THE Congress on Friday took strong exception to how Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla chastised former Congress president Sonia Gandhi over her comment that the Waqf (Amendment) Bill was "bulldozed through" the Lower House.

- PREETHA NAIR @ New Delhi

While addressing party MPs at a meeting of the Congress Parliamentary Party in Samvidhan Sadan here on Thursday, Gandhi had said, "Yesterday, the Waqf (Amendment) Bill was passed in the Lok Sabha. And today it is scheduled to come up in the Rajya Sabha. The Bill was, in effect, bulldozed through." She had added, "Our party's position is clear. The Bill is a brazen assault on the Constitution itself. It is very much part of the BJP's deliberate strategy to keep our society in a state of permanent polarisation."