Satanic Verses row: Chidambaram has proved Congress is an intolerant party, claims Kiren Rijiju

Amidst the ongoing debate over alleged intolerance, Union Minister Kiren Rijiju on Monday  said former Finance Minister P Chidambaram's statement that banning Salman Rushdie's book 'The Satanic Verses' was a mistake has punctured the Congress stand on the controversial issue.

"The atmosphere of intolerance created by Congress was punctured by Chidambaram even before the discussion," he told reporters as Lok Sabha took up the issue for debate. Rijiju, Union Minister of State for Home, said it has now proved that Congress has made a mistake by levelling the allegations that there was an atmosphere of "intolerance".

"Congress itself is an intolerant party. Chidambaram has proved this," he said. Twenty-seven years after the then Rajiv Gandhi government banned Rushdie's controversial novel, Chidambaram had said on Saturday that it was "wrong."

"I have no hesitation in saying that the ban on Salman Rushdie's book was wrong," Chidambaram, who was a Minister of State for Home under the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi when the ban was imposed in October 1988, said speaking at a litfest in New Delhi.