Rahul Gandhi Gets His Bungalow Back After Being Reinstated As MP: Sources

New Delhi:

Congress MP Rahul Gandhi has been re-allotted the government bungalow in Delhi a day after he was reinstated as a parliamentarian after the Supreme Court put a stay on his conviction in the 2019 “Modi surname” defamation case.

The Lok Sabha House Committee has allotted Mr Gandhi his old bungalow at 12, Tughlaq Lane, sources said.

In April, Rahul Gandhi vacated his official residence in central Delhi, in line with protocol, after he was disqualified as an MP in March following a Surat court’s conviction in the criminal defamation case. A disqualified MP is not entitled to a government accommodation and gets a month’s time to vacate the official residence.

The Lok Sabha Housing Committee had asked him to vacate his official bungalow, where he was staying since 2005.

Moving out of his official residence, Rahul Gandhi said he was being “punished” for speaking the truth and said he didn’t want to live in the house anymore since the bungalow, given to him by the people of India, was “snatched away”.

The Supreme Court on Friday ordered a stay on Rahul Gandhi’s conviction and said that while his remarks were not in good taste, his disqualification from parliament would affect his constituents.

Following the court order, the Wayanad MP is back in the Lok Sabha at a time when the parliament is witnessing repeated disruptions over the Opposition bloc INDIA’s demand for a dedicated discussion on the violence in Manipur prefaced by PM Modi’s statement.

Mr Gandhi was disqualified in March after he was awarded a two-year jail term in the defamation case over his comments about PM Modi’s surname. At a rally in Karnataka’s Kolar, ahead of the 2019 general election, in a dig at PM Modi, Mr Gandhi had said, “How come all the thieves have ‘Modi’ as the common surname?”