Parliament session ends on a bitter note

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, APRIL 27. The two Houses of Parliament adjourned sine die today, but not before cumulative bitterness of the budget session asserted itself. Harsh words were spoken and harsher sentiments expressed, signalling that the truce between the ruling NDA and the Opposition, Congress, was over the moment the Finance Bill got passed.

In the Lok Sabha, the Prime Minister, Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee, allowed an unusually partisan and combative note to creep into his concluding remarks. Referring to the allegations against the Government in the wake of the Tehelka expose and the demands for the his resignation, Mr. Vajpayee bitterly complained that he did not deserve this denouement after 40 years in Parliament.

``I was abused in this very House; no one intervened to say this was unparliamentary and that these type of words should not be used,'' he complained. Invoking Lord Rama, Mr. Vajpayee said, ``I am not afraid of death, but I am afraid of infamy.'' Virtually accusing the Opposition of adopting unparliamentary tactics calculated to defame leaders' image, the Prime Minister cautioned that ultimately it was the country's image that was being besmirched.

Later, the Leader of the Opposition, Ms. Sonia Gandhi, promptly hit back, chastising the Prime Minister for sermonising and having called her and her family ``thieves'' in the same House.

Combative tone

Adopting a minatory tone, the Prime Minister cautioned against invoking the morality criterion to demand his resignation. ``There are many issues - and there can be many more - which would enjoin a morality judgment; moral standards cannot be reserved only for one side,'' he warned. For good measure, Mr. Vajpayee also rejected the Congress demand for a JPC on the Tehelka expose. (According to PTI, Mr. Vajpayee said he had spoken of the Government having an ``open mind'' on the issue, but ``open mind does not mean an empty mind''.)

Even Mr. Vajpayee' senior colleagues were taken aback by the unusually combative tone; however, when after the House stood adjourned and the Union Home Minister, Mr. L.K. Advani, went over to the Opposition side to exchange pleasantries, Ms. Sonia Gandhi, Congress president, gave an uninhibited expression of her pent-up feelings of resentment.

Earlier, Ms. Gandhi, in her concluding remarks, reiterated that ``our demand for a JPC was a legitimate one, was a valid one'', and warned that since the Government was unwilling to concede this demand, her party ``will continue to agitate the issue both inside and outside the House''.

It was earlier left to the Speaker, Mr. G.M.C. Balayogi, to refer to the ugly disruptions throughout the session, when the Railway Budget was passed without discussion and amidst a pandemonium. ``I only hope that such a situation of passing the budget without discussion would never recur.''

Walkout in RS

The Rajya Sabha was also adjourned sine die nearly a fortnight ahead of schedule with the Congress staging a protest walkout ahead of the customary end of the session speeches, which were not as acrimonious as in the Lok Sabha.

Returning after the brief protest, the Leader of Opposition, Dr. Manmohan Singh, said the Congress did not favour curtailment of the budget session which began on February 19. He said the Congress would have preferred a discussion on several issues including widespread corruption in defence, national security concerns, the Railway and the general budget among others.

Dr. Singh said his party had ``grave doubts'' about the management of education especially ``attempts to promote a type of obscurantism rather than building scientific temper''. The developments in Central Board of Excise and Customs, and the ``casual'' manner in which decision were taken in telecom sector, he said lead to doubts about transparency and objectivity in decision-making.

Referring to the Government's decision to push second generation economic reforms, Dr. Singh said there should have been a structured debate. He was also critical about the ``casual manner'' in which the Government chose to introduce changes in labour laws through the budget without waiting for report of the Labour Commission.

The External Affairs Minister, Mr. Jaswant Singh, said the Government shared the anguish of the Leader of the Opposition over the premature adjournment. Mr. Singh, who is the Leader of the House, said he did not wish to either trade charges or assign reasons on who was at fault.

The proceedings in the Lok Sabha in particular betrayed the total breakdown of communication and civil manners among the parties. Senior Ministers such as Mr. Advani, Ms. Sushma Swaraj, Mr. Ananth Kumar and Mr. Arun Shourie wore a supercilious look of arrogance and parliamentary insensitivity as the Congress and others staged a walkout on the Tehelka issue.

And as if the bad blood between the BJP and the Congress was not bad enough, the RJD and some others very nearly came to blows and it took some efforts on the part of the Parliamentary Affairs Minister, Mr. Pramod Mahajan, to see to it that the verbal duels did not degenerate into physical assaults.

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