By IANS
New Delhi : The blasts that killed 43 people in Hyderabad divided the Lok Sabha Wednesday with the opposition accusing the government of “vote bank politics”, even as agitated members in the Rajya Sabha forced an adjournment.
As the parliament session resumed after a four-day break to celebrate the Onam and Raksha Bandhan festivals, the MPs debated the weekend blasts, the worst terror attack in south India.
In the Lok Sahba, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led opposition demanded that the Prevention of Terrorism Activities (POTA) Act be brought back to fight “spreading terrorism” networks in the country, but the government ruled it out saying that terror attacks had taken place even when the law existed.
“Let’s not indulge in mudslinging on each other. It is a collective war of people of India (against terrorism) irrespective of party politics,” Parliamentary Affairs Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi said, taking part in a discussion in the Lok Sabha.
Moving an adjournment motion against the “failure of the government to contain terrorist violence as is evident from latest series of incidents, including the Hyderabad blasts,” Janata Dal-United (JD-U) leader Prabhunath Singh criticised Home Minister Shivraj Patil for his “incompetence”.
Some objectionable remarks Singh made against Patil invited sharp reactions from the treasury benches.
Speaking on the motion Leader of Opposition L.K. Advani alleged that the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government had been soft on terrorism.
“I do not think terrorism is linked with any community. But this government has been indulging in vote bank politics instead of being strict on them,” Advani said.
Both Advani and Prabhunath Singh said the absence of POTA had handicapped the government in taking stringent measures against terrorism.
However, Dasmunsi said: “No law can be passed without taking care of the sensitivity of the nation.”
He said Advani, being the former deputy prime minister, should have offered valuable suggestions to help the government in its fight against the menace. “Even with POTA, you could not prevent the parliament attack (2001) and the Raghunath temple attack.
“You are trying to polarise the country,” Dasmunsi said, adding that the UPA government had arrested and put behind bars many operatives of Pakistan’s Inter Service Intelligence (ISI).
Mohammed Salim of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) also urged the MPs to be united to counter terrorism. But he blamed the Andhra Pradesh government for its “lacklustre attitude” towards the intelligence warnings about a possible terror attack in Hyderabad.
Mohan Singh (Samajwadi Party), Sudhakar Reddy (Communist Party of India), Nikhil Kumar (Congress), S. Krishnaswamy (DMK), V.K. Malhotra (BJP), Chandrakant Khaire (Shiv Sena) and Brij Kishore Tripathy (BJD) also took part in the discussion.
Earlier the Lok Sabha condemned the “cowardly, inhuman and diabolic” act of terrorism in Hyderabad. In a statement, Speaker Somnath Chatterjee urged the members to “reiterate the resolve to maintain peace and communal harmony and defeat the divisive forces with courage, fortitude and unity.”
The house observed a one-minute silence to mourn the terror victims.
During the discussion, Dasmunsi and Madhu Gowd Yaskhi, Congress MP from Nizamabad in Andhra Pradesh, praised the people of the state, who have maintained calm and did not fall into the divisive designs of the forces that work against the nation.
The Lok Sabha was adjourned earlier when the Rashtriya Janata Dal and Samajwadi Party MPs disrupted the proceedings over violence in Agra in Uttar Pradesh and police brutality in Bihar’s Bhagalpur district.
While slogan-shouting Samajwadi party MPs, protesting against the Agra incident, rushed to the well of the house as soon as the question hour was over, the RJD members were out of their seats voicing their concern over the incident where a man was beaten up and then dragged behind a motorcycle by two policemen in Nathnagar town of Bhagalpur district.
The speaker then adjourned the house till 12.30 p.m.
In the Rajya Sabha, agitated members forced a brief adjournment of the house as they demanded an immediate statement from the home minister on the incidents in Agra but it was then agreed that the issue could be raised during zero hour immediately after question hour ended.
Eknath Thakur of the Shiv Sena best summed up the mood of the NDA.
“Three steps need to be taken immediately. Hang (parliament attack accused) Afzal today, immediately dismiss the Andhra Pradesh government and restore POTA (Prevention of Terrorism Act),” he said.
The UPA government had revoked POTA that had been enacted by the previous NDA government.
However, the opposition alliance found itself countered by Ram Jethmalani, the law minister in the NDA government who is now an independent member, who also took on the government and its intelligence agencies.
Jethmalani maintained that since terrorism went beyond being a question of law and order, the centre was fully empowered to take action and not hide behind the plea that policing was a state subject.
But he also dismissed the NDA plea to restore POTA, saying, “Neither POTA nor any new law will help in curbing terrorism”.
Warning that “this occasion is pregnant with dangerous potentialities”, he urged members to “eschew party partisanship, stick to the truth and lay the blame where it lies”.
Jethmalani reserved his worst for the intelligence agencies.
“Who gets this information (intelligence) in the government and what do they do with this information?” he demanded.