'Apology To Bodies Found Floating In Ganga': RJD MP's Moving & Powerful Speech Draws Applause

Rashtriya Janata Dal's Rajya Sabha MP Professor Manoj Kumar Jha, in an evocative speech, said that those who lost their lives in the second wave of the pandemic have left behind a ¡°living document of our failure¡±.

Jha began his address with an apology to those who died in the second wave but whose deaths were not even being acknowledged. ¡°This apology is not just from me¡­ we should issue a collective apology from this House for those people whose bodies were floating in the Ganga,¡± Jha said.

He said that even the poorest in this country were taxpayers and a responsibility of a welfare state, and urged the government to work on the right to health and right to work.

"People that have gone left behind a living document of our failure"

The MP said that never before has an obituary of 50 people been read out between two sessions of Parliament. ¡°Was this any age for Rajeev Satav to go from this world? Raghunath Mahapatra?¡­ This pain is personal. I don¡¯t want to talk about numbers. My number, your number. Search for numbers in your pain," Jha said.

He said there is ¡°not one person in this country, in this House¡± who can say they have not lost someone known to them.

¡°People would call for oxygen. We could not arrange it. People think he is an MP, he will arrange oxygen. Of a hundred phone calls, in the evening we would sit and see. Success rate two, success rate three. Who will explain numbers to me? I don¡¯t want to talk about numbers. The people that have gone have left behind a living document of our failure,¡± Jha said.

Attacks govt over "free ration, free vaccine"

Jha attacked the government on advertisements that claim ¡°free vaccines, free ration and free treatment." He asked if India was a welfare state. ¡°If one poor person in a village buys a bar of soap, he is a taxpayer as much as Ambani-Adani. You are telling him free? Nothing is free. He has a stake. There is a commitment of the welfare state. Don¡¯t denigrate him, demonise him,¡± he said.

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His speech drew constant applause from the opposition benches.

He termed the one and a half months of the second wave a ¡°nightmare.¡±

¡°During that time, it was being said that governments didn¡¯t fail, the system failed. What is this system? From childhood we have heard, there is a person behind the system. If the system has failed, whether in Delhi, or in the lanes of a village, then the governments have failed, don¡¯t give it the name of a system. They make the system. There is a need for dignity in life. There is a greater need for dignity in death. We have witnessed undignified deaths. If we don¡¯t fix this, future generations will not forgive us,¡± Jha said.