By IANS
New Delhi : An unqualified apology by India’s envoy to the US Ronen Sen and External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s intervention on his behalf Tuesday failed to cut any ice with agitated MPs, who stalled proceedings in both houses of parliament demanding the envoy’s recall.
The Lok Sabha was adjourned for the day and the Rajya Sabha, which met briefly at 2 p.m. after an adjournment in the pre-lunch session, was again adjourned for two hours.
The MPs were angry at Sen’s reported remarks to Rediff India Abroad alluding to critics of the India-US nuclear deal as “headless chicken”.
In a statement released by Mukherjee, Sen said: “I had an off-the-record conversation with the correspondent giving some assessments on this subject. A number of the comments were, however, either misunderstood or misquoted or quoted out of context.
“For instance, I did not say that the Hyde Act could not be renegotiated, but said that the bilateral agreement could not be renegotiated,” he added.
“For instance, my comment about ‘running around like headless chicken looking for a comment here or comment there’ was a tactless observation on some of my media friends, and most certainly not with reference to any Honourable Member of Parliament. However, if I have unwittingly hurt any sentiments, I offer my unqualified apologies,” the envoy said.
Before releasing the statement Mukherjee had a long meeting with two Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) leaders Sitaram Yechury and Basudeb Acharya to sort out the matter. The full text of the interview was shown to them, even as Parliamentary Affairs Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi joined them for lunch.
The CPI-M leaders refused to budge.
“This is not going to satisfy us. If what he has said is true, then we have called for action against him,” Yechury told reporters.
Thus, as the two houses met for the post-lunch session, CPI-M members joined Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MPs to demand Sen’s recall.
In the Rajya Sabha, an incensed Yashwant Sinha (BJP), a former external affairs minister, alleged that Sen had “not only called us headless, he has called us brainless”.
As soon as the Lok Sabha met at 11 a.m., opposition and Left MPs were on their legs denouncing Sen’s statement.
They were not satisfied with Mukherjee’s explanation that the envoy’s comments were “totally unwarranted and unacceptable”.
“I have sought a clarification from Sen. The correspondent might have misquoted him,” Mukherjee maintained.
Speaker Somnath Chatterjee assured the MPs that if the remarks had indeed been made, action could be taken against the ambassador.
“Parliament is not that powerless. We can take action but not on the basis of newspaper reports,” he maintained.
Chatterjee accepted Leader of Opposition L.K. Advani’s suggestion that the full text of the interview could be asked for and studied. After that action may be taken against the ambassador.
But MPs from the Left parties and the BJP continued disrupting the proceedings, forcing an exasperated speaker to adjourn the house till 11.30 p.m.
The protests, however, continued when the house resumed, forcing the speaker to adjourn it till 2 p.m. With the pandemonium continuing as the post-lunch session commenced, Chatterjee adjourned the house for the day.
In his statement earlier, Mukherjee said he had contacted the ambassador, who had stated that some of his reported comments had been published “either deliberately or through misunderstanding”.
The correspondent, Aziz Hanifa, had also misquoted the ambassador “in several respects”, the minister said.
Mukherjee added: “In democracy there will always be dissension and divergence of opinions. Nobody can accuse others who hold divergent views. I regret the alleged comments, which have hurt the feelings of honourable members.”