Smriti Irani has alleged bias on "right wing" women being abused online
Smriti Irani hit out today at what she alleged is media bias and selective outrage against the online abuse of "right wing women".
Attacks on her, said the minister stressed indignantly, never made it to prime-time debates.
"I get attacked not only by trolls - which I brush away every day. I get attacked by journalists and the senior leadership. Not on content of policy or a programme but on the fact that I am a woman and how I have come so far. But there is no 9 o'clock or 10 o'clock Buck Stops Here on it," the minister said in a fiery interview in Amethi, where she contested the 2014 election.
"You have to distinguish when a journalist becomes a troll, or a female leader becomes abusive, is the system balanced enough to then say that this senior politician should not have done it? I from a right-wing perspective have not seen that much. In Kerala, the Left chops and hacks to death a BJP worker, I don't see much outrage everywhere. From a communications perspective, there is always a question mark that why is it ok to hack to death a right-winger, and there will be no national outrage. Why is it ok for a Dalit girl to be raped and brutally murdered in a Left bastion or a Congress bastion, and none of you will go there and create an outrage?" she remarked.
The minister alleged that even her children were not spared during online attacks on her. "I didn't see outrage when someone said - how can an illiterate woman's daughter win the world Karate championship."
Smriti Irani's comments come at a time trolling by activists or supporters of rival political parties has seasoned a massive debate on online abuse. "If you can't stand the heat get out of the kitchen - that's my personal motto for twitter trolls," she said.
Earlier this week, Ms Irani responded sharply to tweets by Congress spokesperson Priyanka Chaturvedi, who has alleged that she was threatened on social media with "rape like Nirbhaya", remarked that the minister had Z category or a high level of security. In the spat that followed, Ms Irani commented that losing Assam is Rahul Gandhi's forte.
"I didn't have an altercation, in fact I gave her a new lease of political life by acknowledging (her). I'm happy that I could contribute effectively to somebody's rise in the Congress," she quipped.