ABSURDITY & HYPROCISY AT ITS ABYSS in Parliament

If a name “Godse” is unparliamentary, let the intellectuals in Parliament explain how the name “Gandhi” is parliamentary.

‘Godse’ unparliamentary word, rules Kurien on 23/12/2014

Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman P J Kurien on 23/12/2014 declared the name “Godse” as “unparliamentary” and justified it being expunged from the debates in the Upper House. The ruling was made as CPM’s P Rajeev had raised the issue with the presiding officer of the House.

“Last Wednesday, I had raised the issue of Hindu Mahasabha’s plan to install the busts of Nathuram Godse. But, when I went through the verbatim debates later, Godse’s name was expunged. Then I raised a point of order on Friday on which the ruling was reserved. Today, the Chair gave the ruling it was unparliamentary,” CPM’s P Rajeev said.

Even P Rajeev was amused when he was told by the news agency that a Lok Sabha MP had Godse as his surname. “Earlier, if you mention the name of Godse along with any member, then it was used to be expunged. Today, the Chair gave a ruling that Godse is an unparliamentary word.”

Kurien’s ruling might create trouble for the presiding officers in Lok Sabha as well as its members. Hemant Tukaram Godse is the Shiv Sena MP from Nashik and if one goes by the ruling, whenever the Chair or any member address him with his surname, it will be unparliamentary and have to be expunged from the records.

The ruling came at around 1 pm, as the House re-assembled after two adjournments on Tuesday, the 23rd December, 2014.

Kurien said, “Yes, I expunged it….yes, it is declared unparliamentary. That is why I expunged it.”

‘Godse’ expunged, Hemant Godse, Sena MP, asks what about me? [Indian Express, March 14, 2015]

Many have had their books banned, others their movies, but what will you do if your own name figures on a list of “unparliamentary” words?

That’s the “painful and heartrending” question haunting Hemant Godse, Shiv Sena MP from Nashik, who has written to the offices of the Lok Sabha Speaker and Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman, asking them to remove his surname from such a list “with immediate effect”.

In response, officials of the Lok Sabha Secretariat have agreed that the fault of one Godse — Mahatma Gandhi’s assassin Nathuram Godse — cannot be a reason to expunge the word itself from the House, but the Speaker is yet to take a final decision

The officials, meanwhile, dug into their records to understand the context in which “Godse” was classified as unparliamentary.

“It had happened in April 1956 on the directions of the then Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker Sardar Hukam Singh when the House was debating the States Reorganisation Bill,” a source said.

“Two MPs then had uttered Nathuram Godse’s name in the same breath as some renowned spiritual leaders and this had led to this word being expunged,” the source added.

During the last winter session, it was Rajya Sabha Deputy Speaker P J Kurien who pointed this out afresh when CPM’s P Rajeeve raised the Hindu Mahasabha’s plan to install busts of Nathuram Godse in various locations.

“This decision is very painful and heartrending to our community and to me too,” Hemant Godse wrote in January, adding that a large number of people with the same surname live in different parts of Maharashtra.

“As per records of the Honourable Parliament, the word “Godse” has been included among the list of unparliamentary words, which cannot be uttered or used in the hallowed halls of our Parliament. Although I understand the context in which it was originally placed in the list, I wish to bring to your notice that “Godse” is also my ancestral surname. It has a lineage of hundreds of years,” he added.

Wondering how an MP’s surname could be considered unparliamentary, Godse wrote, “It is definitely not my fault that my surname is ‘Godse’ and furthermore, I also cannot and will not change it as it is my ancestral surname.”

Otherwise, the MP added, it would cast “undue aspersion on my surname and that of my ancestors too”.

Justice Kajtu on 8th December, 2012 said that “ninety per cent of Indians are idiots. You people don't have brains in your heads ... It is so easy to take you for a ride". Justice Katju has been vindicated by the Parliamentarians. Is it a Godsephobia or utter hypocrisy? Seems the collective wisdom of Parliamentarians has touched the abyss in hypocrisy.

If a name “Godse” is unparliamentary, let these intellectuals explain how the name “Gandhi” is parliamentary.