By IANS,
New Delhi: The opposition Thursday vociferously demanded Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s resignation following stinging revelations in leaked US diplomatic cables that money was paid to MPs to win the 2008 confidence vote in parliament.The leader of the opposition in the Lok Sabha, Sushma Swaraj, said it was “a blot on Indian democracy” that the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government had resorted to such “shameful” tactics to foil the opposition bid to topple it over the civil nuclear deal with the US.
“They have lost the right to rule. The prime minister should come and announce his resignation today,” Swaraj said, as chaos prevailed in the house over the revelations published in The Hindu newspaper.
Speaker Meira Kumar adjourned the house till 12 noon.
The Wikileaks diplomatic cables quoted the political aide of Congress leader Satish Sharma as saying that a fund of Rs.50 crore had been formed to “buy” MPs for the confidence vote.
A US embassy official was apparently shown two chests of cash in the political aide’s house, kept for the payoffs.
Communist Party of India (CPI) leader Gurudas Dasgupta, thundered that Manmohan Singh should go.
Waving a copy of the leaked cables, he demanded that the prime minister should “come to the house and make a statement”.
“He should resign immediately. This government has no right to remain in power.”
His colleague D. Raja asked the prime minister to “explain his position”.