Amit Shah would have been 'scrap dealer' if there wasn't Ambedkar's Constitution, claims CM
Belagavi (Karnataka) Dec 19: Stepping up the attack against Union Minister Amit Shah for his comments on B R Ambedkar in Parliament, senior Congress leader and Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Thursday claimed that Shah would have been a "Gujari" (scrap dealer) if there wasn't Ambedkar's Constitution.
The chief minister further said that if Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar was really functioning under the Constitution, he should have immediately suspended Shah from the House.
Reading out a detailed statement in the assembly amid din by both BJP and the Congress MLAs over the issue, Siddaramaiah said the entire country has heard the "derogatory" words spoken by the Home Minister about Babasaheb Ambedkar.
During a debate on the Constitution in Rajya Sabha on Tuesday, Shah said, "Abhi ek fashion ho gaya hai - Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar. Itna naam agar bhagwan ka lete to saat janmon tak swarg mil jata (It has become a fashion to say Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar, Ambedkar'. If they had taken God's name so many times, they would have got a place in heaven)."
Stating that there is nothing surprising in the words spoken by Shah, Siddaramaiah said what was in the minds of the BJP and Sangh Parivar leaders has come out in the open.
"First of all, I congratulate you (Amit Shah) for openly and courageously revealing the innermost opinion of the Bharatiya Janata Party about Babasaheb Ambedkar before the country and for finally telling the truth in your lifetime," he said.
He said that if there was no Constitution, Shah would have been a "scrap dealer" in his village and not the Home Minister of the country.
Shah on Wednesday accused the Congress of twisting facts and distorting his comments on B R Ambedkar in the Rajya Sabha, asserting that its malicious campaign after the discussion on Constitution "established" the opposition party as being "anti-Ambedkar and anti-reservation". The Union minister also accused the Congress of adopting the tactic of "misrepresenting and distorting" statements.
Siddaramaiah also took a dig at Dhankhar for not taking action against Shah, saying if the Rajya Sabha Chairman was really functioning under the Constitution, he should have immediately suspended the Union minister from the House after his remarks.
The Karnataka chief minister alleged that the main reason behind BJP and Sangh Parivar's hatred for Ambedkar was the Constitution.
"Until this written Constitution came into force, the Indian society had the Manusmriti, which made caste and gender discrimination a law. Babasaheb Ambedkar, who hoped for freedom, equality and fraternity, not only gave the Constitution, but he also burned the unwritten Constitution Manusmriti that was in force until then," the CM said.
He noted that on December 25, 1927, Ambedkar publicly burned the Manusmriti and 22 years later, he created a new Constitution.
Siddaramaiah charged that the hatred of the BJP and the RSS for Ambedkar was not new.
According to him, the details of the statements made by RSS leaders, including its founder Keshav Baliram Hedgewar, his successor Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar and Hindutva ideologue Vinayak Damodar Savarkar against the Constitution are in the pages of history.
Babasaheb Ambedkar dedicated the Constitution to the country on November 30, 1949. Four days later, the RSS mouthpiece 'Organiser' wrote an editorial against the Constitution, he pointed out.
Siddaramaiah also read out a portion of the article: "There is no Indianness in the Constitution written by Ambedkar'¦. Even today, the laws mentioned in the Manusmriti are respected by the world. None of this counts for the Pandit who wrote the Constitution.''
"The RSS editorial had written against the Constitution, mocking Babasaheb as a ''Pandit''. The RSS is defending this editorial even today," the CM alleged.
"Golwalkar had also opposed Ambedkar and the Constitution in his book, 'Bunch of Thought', which is considered the Constitution of the RSS", he said.
Golwalkar wrote that after the Vedas, the most sacred book for the Hindu nation - Manusmriti, which has been the basis of our culture, traditions and customs since time immemorial, Siddaramaiah said.
Neither the BJP nor the RSS has so far rejected the "RSS editorial" that opposed the Constitution and Ambedkar, nor the views of Golwalkar and Savarkar, he said.
Siddaramaiah said Ambedkar was not an annoyance, but an eternal memory.
"As long as we breathe, as long as the Sun and Moon exist on this Earth, the memory of Ambedkar will be there. The more you insult him, the more he will bounce back and rise, and he will light up our path of progress," he underlined.
The CM also reiterated that if Ambedkar was not there, he and Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge would not have occupied high positions. Instead, he would have had to stay in his village grazing cattle and sheep, he added.
The CM said it was on the expected lines that Shah blamed the opposition for twisting his statement.
"Prime Minister Narendra Modi too came to the defense of his close friend and made a long statement. All this was expected," Siddaramaiah told the Assembly.
The Congress MLAs put out photos of Ambedkar on their tables, while the BJP displayed posters in the assembly, accusing Siddaramaiah of being anti-Hindu. Both sides raised slogans against each other.
The commotion led to the adjournment of the House twice by Speaker U T Khader.
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Single higher education regulator bill tabled in LS; Oppn flags ‘centralisation,' JPC likely
New Delhi: A bill to set up a 13-member body to regulate institutions of higher education was introduced in the Lok Sabha on Monday.
Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan introduced the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, which seeks to establish an overarching higher education commission along with three councils for regulation, accreditation, and ensuring academic standards for universities and higher education institutions in India.
Meanwhile, the move drew strong opposition, with members warning that it could weaken institutional autonomy and result in excessive centralisation of higher education in India.
The Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, 2025, earlier known as the Higher Education Council of India (HECI) Bill, has been introduced in line with the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020.
The proposed legislation seeks to merge three existing regulatory bodies, the University Grants Commission (UGC), the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), and the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), into a single unified body called the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan.
At present, the UGC regulates non-technical higher education institutions, the AICTE oversees technical education, and the NCTE governs teacher education in India.
Under the proposed framework, the new commission will function through three separate councils responsible for regulation, accreditation, and the maintenance of academic standards across universities and higher education institutions in the country.
According to the Bill, the present challenges faced by higher educational institutions due to the multiplicity of regulators having non-harmonised regulatory approval protocols will be done away with.
The higher education commission, which will be headed by a chairperson appointed by the President of India, will cover all central universities and colleges under it, institutes of national importance functioning under the administrative purview of the Ministry of Education, including IITs, NITs, IISc, IISERs, IIMs, and IIITs.
At present, IITs and IIMs are not regulated by the University Grants Commission (UGC).
Government to refer bill to JPC; Oppn slams it
The government has expressed its willingness to refer it to a joint committee after several members of the Lok Sabha expressed strong opposition to the Bill, stating that they were not given time to study its provisions.
Responding to the opposition, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said the government intends to refer the Bill to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) for detailed examination.
Congress Lok Sabha MP Manish Tewari warned that the Bill could result in “excessive centralisation” of higher education. He argued that the proposed law violates the constitutional division of legislative powers between the Union and the states.
According to him, the Bill goes beyond setting academic standards and intrudes into areas such as administration, affiliation, and the establishment and closure of university campuses. These matters, he said, fall under Entry 25 of the Concurrent List and Entry 32 of the State List, which cover the incorporation and regulation of state universities.
Tewari further stated that the Bill suffers from “excessive delegation of legislative power” to the proposed commission. He pointed out that crucial aspects such as accreditation frameworks, degree-granting powers, penalties, institutional autonomy, and even the supersession of institutions are left to be decided through rules, regulations, and executive directions. He argued that this amounts to a violation of established constitutional principles governing delegated legislation.
Under the Bill, the regulatory council will have the power to impose heavy penalties on higher education institutions for violating provisions of the Act or related rules. Penalties range from ₹10 lakh to ₹75 lakh for repeated violations, while establishing an institution without approval from the commission or the state government could attract a fine of up to ₹2 crore.
Concerns were also raised by members from southern states over the Hindi nomenclature of the Bill. N.K. Premachandran, an MP from the Revolutionary Socialist Party representing Kollam in Kerala, said even the name of the Bill was difficult to pronounce.
He pointed out that under Article 348 of the Constitution, the text of any Bill introduced in Parliament must be in English unless Parliament decides otherwise.
DMK MP T.M. Selvaganapathy also criticised the government for naming laws and schemes only in Hindi. He said the Constitution clearly mandates that the nomenclature of a Bill should be in English so that citizens across the country can understand its intent.
Congress MP S. Jothimani from Tamil Nadu’s Karur constituency described the Bill as another attempt to impose Hindi and termed it “an attack on federalism.”
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