New Delhi:- Wit, barbs, sarcasm and poetry marked Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s reply on the motion of thanks to President’s address in Rajya Sabha today, which he concluded with renowned poet and lyricist Nida Fazli’s poem “Safar Me Dhoop to Hogi”.
The Prime Minister also invoked the image of “death” to take potshots at Congress during his reply and said the main Opposition party, like death, never gets any blame for whatever happens.
“Death has a blessing. It never gets blamed for anything.
If somebody dies, the blame goes to reasons like cancer, age..
Death itself is never blamed or defamed. Sometimes I feel that Congress also has this blessing… Congress never gets the blame,” he said.
Barring the imagery of death, his other references were mild and light ones even though sarcasm was not missing.
Modi, who had arrived in the House minutes before it commenced in the afternoon, walked up to Opposition benches and mingled with them exchanging pleasantries.
He shook hands Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and party veteran Karan Singh sitting together and had a brief chat with Leader of Opposition Ghulam Nabi Azad.
As he was moving in first rows of Opposition benches, members from other Opposition parties sitting in back rows drew his attention towards them.
Samwajwadi Party MP Choudhary Munawwar Saleem recited an Urdu couplet to the Prime Minister, which could not be heard in the din.
After shaking hands with JD-U President Sharad Yadav, the Prime Minister walked up its general secretary K C Tyagi.
The poetic ambience continued during the reply even as members from treasury and ruling benches occasionally engaged in verbal sparring.
PTI
