After a lot of chaos in the Upper House during the ongoing Winter Session, Rajya Sabha on Thursday finally saw the start of a debate on the banning of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes and its political and economic fallout.
However, there was one moment, when the tense atmosphere of the Upper House gave way to brief laughter.
It was during Naresh Agrawal’s speech, when both Prime Minister and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley burst into lughter.
During his speech, Agrawal joked that Modi had kept even his finance minister in the dark on demonetisation announcement.
He said, “There are those who say the PM did not take (even) Arun Jaitley into confidence (about the notes ban). If Arun ji had known, he would have whispered this to us, he knows me.”
This left both the PM and Jaitley in splits.
On another occasion when Modi and Jaitley laughed was when Agrawal reassured the PM, “Don’t worry for your safety at least in Uttar Pradesh.”
Uttar Pradesh is currently governed by Agrawal’s Samajwadi Party.
Modi, in couple of speeches (one in Goa and another in Agra) had said that there was a danger to his life following his decision to curb black money in the country.