Last Update: February 23, 2023, 20:41 IST
Congress national spokesperson Pawan Kheda (File photo: PTI)
Khera recently misspelled the PM’s name as “Narendra Gautamdas Modi” while addressing a press conference to demand a probe by a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) against the Adani group.
Assam Police on Thursday arrested senior Congress leader Pawan Khera from the Delhi airport in connection with an FIR lodged against him for his alleged objectionable remarks against Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Khera, who was on his way to Raipur to attend the party’s plenary session, was earlier offloaded from an Indigo flight, leading to a political standoff between the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Later, the Supreme Court ordered interim bail to the Congress leader till February 28 and agreed to club all the FIRs against him. The top court listed the matter for further hearing on February 27, along with the response of Assam and Uttar Pradesh on Khera’s plea seeking clubbing of multiple FIRs filed against him.
Who is Pawan Kheda? in 10 points
Pawan Khera started his political career in the 1980s as a Youth Congress worker in Udaipur, Rajasthan.
However, he left the party after the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991.
▶ He rejoined the party in 1998 and joined Sheila Dikshit, who was preparing to lead the Congress in the upcoming assembly elections in the national capital, as president of the party’s Delhi unit.
▶ After Dikshit won the election, he became her political secretary and looked after her media and political affairs. Khera held the position for 15 years till Dixit’s tenure ended in 2013.
▶ Since 2015, Khera has emerged as the political face of the Congress and has been representing the party in debates and discussions on television channels.
▶ He was promoted as the national spokesperson of the party in 2018 by the then Congress President Rahul Gandhi.
▶ Since then, he has been seen as an outspoken critic of the ruling party, the BJP, and has often spoken out against its policies and decisions.
A year later, before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Khera was made the convenor of a poll committee of the Congress.
▶In May last year, 53-year-old Khera was among Congress leaders hoping to get a Rajya Sabha berth. However, he was ignored by the party.
▶ In June 2022, the Congress appointed him as the chairman of the Media and Publicity Department.
Kheda’s comment on PM Modi and BJP’s objection
Khera recently misspelled the PM’s name as “Narendra Gautamdas Modi” while addressing a press conference to demand a probe by a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) against the Adani group. He later clarified that he had become confused.
Prime Minister Modi’s full name is Narendra Damodardas Modi, with the middle name Damodardas standing for his father’s name, a common practice in many parts of the country.
The BJP has called it an ‘insult to the Prime Minister and his father’.
BJP MLC Mukesh Sharma, who filed a complaint against Kheda at Lucknow’s Hazratganj Kotwali police station, said that Kheda talked about the Prime Minister’s late father Damodar Das Moolchand Modi and made lewd comments.
“Kheda mocked Modi by combining his father’s name with that of Gautam Adani’s father. He made a sarcastic comment on Narendra Modi.”
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