Hibi's Hindi, Kodikunnil's inverted 'Constitution', Tharoor's absence; how Kerala MPs took oath in Lok Sabha
Shashi Tharoor was a notable absentee among Kerala MPs while Rahul Gandhi, who has vacated Wayanad, was present in the house.
Shashi Tharoor was a notable absentee among Kerala MPs while Rahul Gandhi, who has vacated Wayanad, was present in the house.
Shashi Tharoor was a notable absentee among Kerala MPs while Rahul Gandhi, who has vacated Wayanad, was present in the house.
The oath-taking ceremony of elected MPs from Kerala was as diverse as it gets. While the majority chose Malayalam, a few opted for English and one, Hibi Eden from Ernakulam, took his oath in Hindi.
Of the 20 MPs from Kerala, 18 took oath on the day. BJP's first-ever elected MP, Suresh Gopi, a union minister in the NDA government, took oath earlier in the day along with his colleagues in the cabinet.
Rahul Gandhi, who vacated his seat from Wayanad and chose to represent his second constituency of Raebareli in the lower house, was seated alongside Kerala's Congress MPs. A notable absentee was Thiruvananthapuram MP Shashi Tharoor, who is understood to be abroad. Earlier in the day, Tharoor had, however, posted on social media that he would be swearing-in as a member of the 18th Lok Sabha on Monday.
K Radhakrishnan, the only LDF representative from Kerala, 'solemnly affirmed' his duties to the house while the majority swore in, 'in the name of God'. Eight Congress MPs -- Shafi Parambil, K Raghavan, VK Sreekandan, Benny Behanan, Hibi Eden, Dean Kuriakose, KC Venugopal and Kodikunnil Suresh -- stepped up with a copy of the Constitution. It was a trend set by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi during the Lok Sabha polls.
While Shafi, Dean, Benny and Venugopal held up the Constitution as they read from the form of affirmation, Sreekandan had it pressed against his chest. Kodikunnil probably did not realise that he held the book upside down as he took oath.
The MPs who took oath in Malayalam were Rajmohan Unnithan, K Sudhakaran, ET Muhammed Basheer, MP Abdusamad Samadhani, K Radhakrishnan, VK Sreekandan, Dean Kuriakose, Francis George, Kodikunnil Suresh and Anto Antony. Those who took oath in English: Shafi Parambil, KC Venugopal, NK Premachandran and Adoor Prakash.
Meanwhile, MPs from other states took oaths in their respective regional languages and also in Sanskrit. Prime Minister Narendra Modi took his oath in Hindi amid slogans of "Jai Shri Ram" from the treasury benches. Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari, Women and Child Development Minister Annapurna Devi, Telecom Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia and Urban Development Minister ML Khattar were among those who took oath in Hindi.