Undaunted by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj’s spirited fightback and backing by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Congress on Thursday said it would persist with raising questions on the Lalit Modi controversy as government has ‘failed’ to respond on key issues.
The party also demanded “unqualified apology” from Swaraj for allegations against Rajiv Gandhi during Wednesday’s debate in the Lok Sabha and approached the Speaker to seek expunction of the charges against the former Prime Minister.
“Swaraj and Jaitley put up a last-ditch effort. They did everything except to answer crucial questions that arose out of Swaraj’s intervention on behalf of Lalit Modi,” the controversial former IPL boss, senior party leader P Chidambaram told reporters.
Chidambaram noted that there were basically three sets of questions, one relating to the External Affairs Minister’s intervention, second the passport case of Lalit Modi and third the letters he had written as Finance Minister to his British counterpart. He insisted that Swaraj and Jaitley had not answered them.
“I am afraid that the two Ministers have failed the government and the people. Instead of a debate, we got a diatribe. Instead of answers, we got sermons. Instead of facts, we got a fudge.”
“If the Ministers think that these questions will go away, I am afraid they will not”, Chidambaram said at the AICC briefing, wondering why government was not releasing letters written by him as Finance Minister to his British counterpart.