By IANS
New Delhi : The Congress and Left parties Thursday said the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was indulging in disruptive politics and denying parliament opportunities to debate major issues like the nuclear agreement with the US and a report on the socio-economic condition of Muslims.
“It is a never-do-anything opposition. It comes, disrupts and departs. They have become a national disruptive alliance,” Congress spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi said.
The BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) has been stalling the proceedings of both houses of parliament demanding a joint parliamentary committee (JPC) on the India-US nuclear agreement.
The government has categorically ruled out formation of a JPC, saying that bilateral agreements need not have parliament’s ratification.
The Communist Party of India (CPI) alleged that the BJP was “deliberately paralysing” parliament giving the government an opportunity to wriggle out of its responsibilities.
“Parliament is recklessly delinquent and shamefully irrelevant,” CPI MP Gurudas Dasgupta said pointing out that the monsoon session that began in the second week of August had already lost 72 hours due to disruptions.
“It is a political gamble. They (BJP) are looking for a new combination so that they can form the government. It is a gamble of numbers,” he told reporters here.
Criticising the opposition’s decision to stall the proceedings till the government agrees to a JPC, Dasgupta said: “If they want to coerce the government, they have other methods. They can boycott parliament or stage a walkout every day. The Left MPs had resigned from the Lok Sabha protesting against the Bofors pay-off scandal (in the 1980s).”
He said the BJP did not want discussion on the Rajinder Sachar committee’s report on the socio-economic and educational status of Muslims in the country and on the nuclear deal.
“If a discussion takes place, many things will come out. It was the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government that had first forged close ties with the US,” Dasgupta said.