House logjam: BJP dangles bait, Cong refuses to bite

An aggressive government on Sunday blamed the Congress of running away from the debate on corruption inside the House. The comments came a day before an all-party meeting called to end the logjam in the almost washed out Monsoon session of the Parliament. However, the government also added a conciliatory note saying Prime Minister Narendra Modi could intervene if a debate on the matter was allowed.

Using the carrot and stick policy, the government on Sunday showed that while it was ready for debate there was no question of bowing to the Opposition demand for resignation of its leaders. 

Appealing to the Congress to break the deadlock, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Venkaiah Naidu on Sunday hinted that Prime Minister Narendra Modi may speak in Parliament. “The government is willing to walk (an) extra mile to placate the Opposition. The Prime Minister can intervene if the debate warrants an intervention,” Naidu said.

However, on the other hand, Union Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, claimed that Congress has put itself in an “untenable position” and has “pushed itself against the wall” by demanding resignations of the External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje over the Lalit Modi controversy as well as the Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan over the Vyapam scam. 

The Minister added that the “honourable exit” for the Congress would be to have a debate on the issue in Parliament. Dubbing Congress as “confused”, Sitharaman stated that earlier, the Congress had demanded a debate on the Lalit Modi issue. But when the government agreed to it immediately “and to the shock of Congress”, they demanded that the resignations should come first and only then would they participate in a debate.

Reiterating the view, Sitharaman’s senior colleague Ravi Shankar Prasad claimed, “Sushmaji has been ready to make a statement in Parliament from the first day (of monsoon session). As far as the Vyapam issue is concerned, the Congress must understand that issues of states are not debated in Parliament.”

On the other hand, the Congress looked unlikely to take the bait and enter into a debate with the government. A meeting of the general body of the Congress Parliamentary Party (CPP) has been called today morning before the all-party meet. This will be the first meeting of the CPP general body in the Monsoon session, which has seen an aggressive Congress seeking the resignations of the ‘tainted’ BJP leaders. Party chief Sonia Gandhi will be addressing the meeting and laying out the party’s strategy. 

The Congress has already stated that its participation in an all -party meeting to break the two-week-long deadlock in Parliament depends on a “tangible” proposal from Prime Minister Narendra Modi adhering to the opposition’s demands. However, there have been some voices of dissent within the Congress, predominantly that of former minister Shashi Tharoor, who is all for the smooth functioning of the Parliament.