Furore over Cong MP’s remark on Rashtrapati

A controversial remark by Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury on President Droupadi Murmu sparked a storm in Parliament on Thursday, with Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) members disrupting proceedings in both Houses and demanding an apology for the "sexist insult".

- Smriti Kak Ramachandran

The row began on Wednesday afternoon when Chowdhury was speaking to reporters while sitting in a protest alongside Congress lawmakers who were suspended for alleged misconduct.

In his answers to a Hindi news channel, Chowdhury repeatedly referred to the President as "Rashtrapatni" instead of the Hindi word for president, Rashtrapati, prompting the reporter to tell him that this was improper.

Chowdhury later said that he misspoke because he is not a native Hindi speaker but the BJP said the comment was a deliberate sexist reference to India's first tribal woman president, pointing out that he appeared to use the word deliberately, not once but twice. The BJP raised the issue in Parliament and outside, underlining that this was not a one-off instance of disrespect towards the President by the Congress and that disparaging remarks were made against Murmu by party leaders soon after her nomination for the top constitutional position.

Both Houses of Parliament were disrupted and adjourned multiple times as the government and Opposition sparred over the issue. "Any(one with) common-sense... with a common understanding knows that Rashtrapati is a gender-agnostic word representing the leader of the country...Therefore, I think it is not the slip of the tongue. It was a deliberate sexist insult," said finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman in the Rajya Sabha.