'Opposition not for overthrowing government' -15 Dec 2010

'Opposition not for overthrowing government'

Anita Saluja

Express News ServiceFirst Published : 15 Dec 2010

03:41:01 AM ISTLast Updated : 15 Dec 2010 10:47:45 AM IST

NEW DELHI: The Opposition is not interested in overthrowing the UPA Government and pushing the nation to yet another Lok Sabha election, just one-and-a-half years after the last parliamentary poll. This was made clear by NDA working chairman L K Advani on Tuesday, while unveiling the NDA plan to hit the streets and take the battle against corruption to people.


Advani blamed a Union Minister for the talk on snap poll and said this was done as a part of scare-mongering. Instead, the Opposition wants to highlight the 2G spectrum scam running into `1.76 lakh crore, which is the biggest scam in the history of independent India.

The two-month-long agitational plan is to keep the issue alive till the commencement of the Budget session of Parliament due in February 2011. Targeting Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Advani regretted that the Prime Minister was more worried about the credibility of the corporates, in the wake of the Niira Radia tapes, than about the deeper malaise of lobbyists taking over the Cabinet-formation exercise. The Prime Minister is worried over tapes leakage, showing his concern for corporates, rather than the bigger problem on hand, Advani said.

The lobbyists decide which party gets a portfolio and which person in a party gets it and how the policies are framed. This is not decided either by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh or Congress president Sonia Gandhi, he said.

According to Advani, it was well-known that Manmohan Singh could never make his Cabinet. The Opposition was under the mistaken impression that the exercise was undertaken at 10, Janpath, the residence of Sonia Gandhi. Now, it is clear that this was done by the lobbyists.

Kickstarting the Brashtachar Virodhi Mahasangram (crusade against corruption) with the first rally in the Capital on December 22, the NDA has planned similar rallies in Ludhiana, Rohtak, Jaipur, Lucknow, Patna, Bhubaneswar, Bhopal, Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Chennai.

The just-concluded winter session of Parliament was unprecedented for two reasons, he said. First, the entire session was a complete washout. Secondly, it marked the complete isolation of the Congress. Although the entire Opposition was not together, it was unanimous in its demand for a JPC. Even the Congress allies were in agreement with the principal demand of the Opposition for a JPC probe.