'Himmat Hai Toh Aaja': Chaos in Lok Sabha after Congress's Channi Taunts BJP's Bittu over Grandfather Beant's Death

The discussion on the union budget in the Lok Sabha on Thursday afternoon took an ugly turn while Congress MP and former Punjab chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi was speaking when he took a dig at former party colleague Ravneet Singh Bittu.

“Your late father (mistakenly said instead of ‘grandfather’) was a martyr but he actually died the day you joined the BJP,” Channi said, targeting the union minister of state.

Bittu’s grandfather, former Congress chief minister Beant Singh, was assassinated in a suicide bomb attack at the secretariat complex in Chandigarh on August 31, 1995.

Channi went on to insinuate that there was no difference between the British Raj and the present Narendra Modi government “except the skin colour”. He took further potshots at the government over its “dictatorial attitude”.

An irate Bittu stood up to speak, saying he must answer his former party colleague. “I have to respond because he took the name of my grandfather. My grandfather did not lay down his life for a party but for the country,” he said.

Bittu went on to say that he would change his name if Channi could prove that he was poor. He alleged that the Congress MP has the most powerful resources and most money in Punjab to date. He also claimed that Channi was an accused in a sexual harassment case. Responding to the Congress leader’s “skin colour” comment, Bittu said that it seemed he was referring to Sonia Gandhi and asked the party to prove which country she came from.

Following this, there was chaos in the Lok Sabha, as Punjab Congress MPs stormed into the well, challenging Bittu to a fight. “Himmat hai toh aaja (Come if you dare),” a Congress lawmaker could be heard saying. Bittu tried to rush into the well but was stopped by defence minister Rajnath Singh, who asked him to calm down.

Bittu, a three-term former Congress MP from Punjab, had joined the BJP just ahead of the April-June Lok Sabha polls, triggering a wave of animosity from his former party colleagues. He contested on a BJP ticket seeking re-election from the Ludhiana Lok Sabha seat but lost to Congress’s Amrinder Singh Raja Warring. However, he was inducted into Narendra Modi’s council of ministers as an MoS and is likely to be brought to Parliament soon through the Rajya Sabha route.