BJP fuels Parliament deadlock heat, guns for PM's head

New Delhi, Aug 22: Stalling Parliament for the second consecutive day, BJP escalated its confrontation with the government but appeared isolated with ally JD-U expressing reservations over its strategy and Trinamool Congress rejecting its invitation to target the Prime Minister.

Persisting with its demand that nothing less than Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's resignation would satisfy them, the BJP disrupted proceedings in both the Houses.

Later, the party raised the level of confrontation with the Government by its members walking out of the Joint Parliamentary Committee on 2G scam when its demand for summoning the Prime Minister and Finance Minister P Chidambaram and key PMO officials.

However, BJP's strategy of disrupting Parliament did not find favour with JD-U whose leader Sharad Yadav, who is also the NDA convenor, said discussions should take place in the two Houses on the coal block allocation issue.

At the same time, the JD-U said it was with BJP for the sake of NDA discipline and unity but that would be at the most for another two days.

In an attempt to assess the mood of other parties, Yadav talked to leaders of CPI-CPM, TDP, SP and BSP who favoured debate instead of disruption. On its part, BJP went on the offensive on its demand for Prime Minister's resignation on the ground that former Telecom Minister A Raja and Dayanidhi Maran had to quit. "As A Raja had to go for 2G scam, and Dayanidhi Maran had to resign for his role in Aircel-Maxis deal, similarly the then Coal Minister Manmohan Singh has to go," BJP spokesperson Prakash Javadekar said. As the stalemate continued, Congress mounted attack both on BJP and the CAG accusing the government auditor of "crossing the limits" and the Opposition party of playing the police, prosecutor and the judge at the same time.

Trashing the BJP's demand, party spokesperson Rashid Alvi said, "There is no question of the Prime Minister resigning... Prime Minister's image is very clean...nobody turns an accused or delinquent only by BJP's allegations."

Talking separately, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pawan Kumar Bansal spoke in a similar vein. He said that the BJP was "running away" from Parliament as it knows that a debate would see the treasury benches ripping apart the Opposition charges.

PTI