Student told me ‘andhbhakt is convinced one person is God’: Rahul Gandhi
Speaking on the Cockroach Janta Party and student-led protests against exam paper leaks, Rahul Gandhi sparked a row in the Lok Sabha by referring to categories of people, including 'andhbhakts', as outlined to him by a young student.
‘Students and andhbhakts’ – two of three categories that formed the cornerstone of a fiery Wednesday afternoon speech by Rahul Gandhi in Parliament, delivered as the house resumed its discussion of the government’s new anti-paper leaks law. The word for the third prompted protests by MPs from the ruling BJP and later expunged from the records by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla.
Gandhi began innocently enough.
“I was wondering how I should start this speech… I thought a good point would a conversation I had with some students – young girls – which gave me an interesting perspective. I asked her – ‘does it mean you study in a school or college?'” the Congress MP said.
“She gave me a beautiful answer – ‘a student is someone who has an open mind. One who accepts he doesn’t know everything.”
And then the hammer fell.
Gandhi said the student told him: ”There is another group of people… convinced they know everything… believe they are God.'”
It was the word for this category that the Speaker found to be objectionable and struck from the record.
LIVE UPDATES | Parts of Rahul Gandhi’s speech to be expunged, says Speaker
“So then I asked her, ‘what about the third category – the ‘andhbhakt’? She said an ‘andhbhakt’ is convinced another person is God,” he thundered, his voice nearly drowned out by BJP MPs trying to out-shout him. But Gandhi, undaunted, went on.
The first challenge came from Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju.
“Through a student, he is using an (objectionable) word. It is him who is using the unparliamentary word. He can’t use it,” the minister complained, to which Gandhi responded with a mocking, “But I didn’t use it for you.”
Outrage over that word aside, Gandhi continued (after objections from Rijiju and calls for calm by the Speaker) with an emotional appeal for students, particularly from the poorer sections of society, who spend lakhs on tuitions and coaching classes, only to see their hard work come to naught because of leaked question papers.
#WATCH | Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju intervenes and says, “Had Rahul Gandhi not used unparliamentary word, nobody would have objected. I believe that he is using a word in the name of a student, but it is he who is using it…He cannot use unparliamentary word, it… pic.twitter.com/5qAf2bnkpw
— ANI (@ANI) July 29, 2026
“The rich pay…Rs 30-40 lakh… and get through. The poor are bypassed. Our system is cruel. Lakhs and lakhs of rupees are taken from our students. Everything is privatised (then) papers are leaked. It is extortion…”
“It is a system that has been captured. The soul has been captured by the RSS,” he thundered, training his guns next on Dharmendra Pradhan, who resigned as Education Minister last week after 36 days of Cockroach Janta Party-led protests at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar, and his replacement, Pralhad Joshi.
“The resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan is superficial because he never ran the education system. The education ministry is run by the RSS… The man who runs it (now) is the OSD sitting in the minister’s office.”
“Students are not allowed to be students in India… not allowed to follow their passion… not allowed to ask questions. So now students are saying ‘we will not become ‘andhbhakts’… they stood there – brave, imaginative, powerful – and faced whatever you threw at them,” Gandhi said, referring to the masses of school and college students who participated in the Jantar Mantar sit-in protest and through police lathi charges.
By this time the Lok Sabha was in utter chaos, a state of affairs that became worse after Gandhi also took on Home Minister Amit Shah, saying he was absent from this discussion because of fear.
That remark proved to the final straw; the house erupted in even more chaos, forcing the Speaker to adjourn proceedings till 3 pm.
‘Students and andhbhakts’ – two of three categories that formed the cornerstone of a fiery Wednesday afternoon speech by Rahul Gandhi in Parliament, delivered as the house resumed its discussion of the government’s new anti-paper leaks law. The word for the third prompted protests by MPs from the ruling BJP and later expunged from the records by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla.
Gandhi began innocently enough.
“I was wondering how I should start this speech… I thought a good point would a conversation I had with some students – young girls – which gave me an interesting perspective. I asked her – ‘does it mean you study in a school or college?'” the Congress MP said.
“She gave me a beautiful answer – ‘a student is someone who has an open mind. One who accepts he doesn’t know everything.”
And then the hammer fell.
Gandhi said the student told him: ”There is another group of people… convinced they know everything… believe they are God.'”
It was the word for this category that the Speaker found to be objectionable and struck from the record.
LIVE UPDATES | Parts of Rahul Gandhi’s speech to be expunged, says Speaker
“So then I asked her, ‘what about the third category – the ‘andhbhakt’? She said an ‘andhbhakt’ is convinced another person is God,” he thundered, his voice nearly drowned out by BJP MPs trying to out-shout him. But Gandhi, undaunted, went on.
The first challenge came from Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju.
“Through a student, he is using an (objectionable) word. It is him who is using the unparliamentary word. He can’t use it,” the minister complained, to which Gandhi responded with a mocking, “But I didn’t use it for you.”
Outrage over that word aside, Gandhi continued (after objections from Rijiju and calls for calm by the Speaker) with an emotional appeal for students, particularly from the poorer sections of society, who spend lakhs on tuitions and coaching classes, only to see their hard work come to naught because of leaked question papers.
#WATCH | Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju intervenes and says, “Had Rahul Gandhi not used unparliamentary word, nobody would have objected. I believe that he is using a word in the name of a student, but it is he who is using it…He cannot use unparliamentary word, it… pic.twitter.com/5qAf2bnkpw
— ANI (@ANI) July 29, 2026
“The rich pay…Rs 30-40 lakh… and get through. The poor are bypassed. Our system is cruel. Lakhs and lakhs of rupees are taken from our students. Everything is privatised (then) papers are leaked. It is extortion…”
“It is a system that has been captured. The soul has been captured by the RSS,” he thundered, training his guns next on Dharmendra Pradhan, who resigned as Education Minister last week after 36 days of Cockroach Janta Party-led protests at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar, and his replacement, Pralhad Joshi.
“The resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan is superficial because he never ran the education system. The education ministry is run by the RSS… The man who runs it (now) is the OSD sitting in the minister’s office.”
“Students are not allowed to be students in India… not allowed to follow their passion… not allowed to ask questions. So now students are saying ‘we will not become ‘andhbhakts’… they stood there – brave, imaginative, powerful – and faced whatever you threw at them,” Gandhi said, referring to the masses of school and college students who participated in the Jantar Mantar sit-in protest and through police lathi charges.
By this time the Lok Sabha was in utter chaos, a state of affairs that became worse after Gandhi also took on Home Minister Amit Shah, saying he was absent from this discussion because of fear.
That remark proved to the final straw; the house erupted in even more chaos, forcing the Speaker to adjourn proceedings till 3 pm.
