Digvijay rakes up Irani's education issue, asks PM to clarify

Bhopal: Senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh on Saturday raked up the "educational qualification" of Union HRD Minster Smriti Irani in the context of her diatribe in Parliament and asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to clear the air on the issue.

"I demand from Modi to clarify how much she (Irani) is actually qualified, as in every election paper (affidavit) her education level gets changed," Singh told reporters.

Taking a swipe at Irani, Singh said the minister should have realised that Parliament is not a "television studio" before delivering her speech.

"The previous NDA government under Atal Bihari Vajpayee had made the best person in Murli Manohar Joshi as Education Minister who was the youngest professor at Allahabad University. Didn't Modi government find anybody better than Irani," he asked.

In her fiery speech in Lok Sabha recently, Irani strongly defended her government facing flak over the sedition charges slapped on some JNU students and the suicide of Hyderabad Central University (HCU) Dalit student Rohith Vemula.

Referring to the JNU row, Singh said the Delhi police arrested the JNUSU president Kanhaiya Kumar though he did not raise any anti-national slogan at the varsity event.

"I am impressed by Kanhaiya's speech. He has not raised any anti-national slogan in his address. Despite that Delhi Police arrested him for no fault," he said.

Singh also defended Rahul Gandhi in the view of the criticism by BJP, saying the Congress Vice-President had also demanded action against those who allegedly raised anti-national slogans.

Opposition parties had last year sought ouster of Irani while accusing her of giving "false" information about her educational qualification in affidavits filed with the Election Commission.