India Inc joins 17,000-strong online plea to end Parliament logjam

New Delhi, Aug 12: Industry leaders, including Rahul Bajaj, Adi Godrej and Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, have signed an online petition along with 17,000 persons against continued disruptions in Parliament, asking all political parties to end the logjam.

While the call from the 'disheartened' petitioners to begin a consultative and collaborative process for passage of key reforms Bills found support from Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, it was used by JD-U chief Sharad Yadav to attack the government.

Yadav said the charge that the BJP government was "a government for moneybags has been vindicated" in the attack on Parliament by "capitalists".

Started by industry body Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) five days ago, the online petition has been signed by top business leaders such as Infosys Co-Founder Kris Gopalakrishnan, Hero Group Chairman Pawan Munjal among others.

More than 17,000 persons have already signed the petition on Change.org. Elaborating on the petition, CII said the parliamentary paralysis can lead to weakening of India's democracy.

"Recent events have been disheartening. They have the potential of eroding popular faith in Parliament. We, therefore, urge all political parties to have a collaborative and consultative process in Parliament and allow it to function, debate and legislate," CII said.

Supporting the petition, Jaitley said: "Every segment of society has an interest in India's democracy and India's Parliament functioning. And therefore to say that nobody can express an opinion outside Parliament that Parliament must function, I think it is a thought and idea which is to be rejected."

Apart from industrialists, academicians such as IIM Ahmedabad Professor Piyush Kumar Sinha and IIT Madras Professor Ashok Jhunjhunwala have signed the petition.

PTI