Arun Jaitley slams Rahul over Parliament remark

Arun Jaitley said: "The Congress is facing a coup within their own party. For that you need not drag the House or the presiding officer into the debate."

"Day after day established leaders are speaking out. If you want to show that you are doing something, it's better you lead your party," Jaitley said referring to Rahul.

He said Rahul is under pressure from within the party.

He said  Congress has disturbed the House for no reason. "There is not a single instance where they have not be allowed to raise issue. The question there is why has the party made an issue out of a non-issue," Jaitley asked.

"It is time for Congress party to introspect," he said.

Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan also parried the allegation that she is not allowing Opposition to speak.

She said she is trying to be fair and transparent by giving chance to everyone and would not respond to allegations.

After Rahul Gandhi said they were not being allowed to speak in Parliament and that only one man's voice is heard alluding to PM Modi, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh said the PM neither a dictator nor communal.

"The PM is neither a dictator nor communal. If he was, he wouldn't have got such a massive mandate," Rajnath Singh told reporters outside Parliament.

Earlier Parliamentary Affairs Minister Venkaiah Naidu said the Congress is raising the issue (of communal violence) in a wrong way in the House and making sweeping allegations.

Adding that the government is ready for any debate, Naidu said "there is peace in the country, let peace prevail in Parliament."

Rahul Gandhi after leading his party in Parliament, entering the well of the House and demanding debate on the Communal Violence Bill in view of the Meerut situation where a teacher was gang-raped by members of another community and was alleged forced to convert, said: “We are not being allowed to speak in Parliament. We are asking for a discussion. There is a mentality in the government that discussion is not acceptable. Everybody feels it. We feel it. There is a mood in Parliament that only one man’s voice counts for anything in this country."

Gandhi   marched to the well of the House, along with other Congress MPs, after Speaker Sumitra Mahajan refused to allow a discussion on the Communal Violence Bill taking place in Uttar Pradesh and other parts of the country.

The Congress had sought an adjournment of the house proceedings to discuss communal violence issue.

Asked about his rare show of protest in Parliament, the 44-year-old Congress parliamentarian said, “I have raised my voice many times in Parliament”