The Hindu : CPI accuses PM of opportunism

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, May 02, 2002

National

National

CPI accuses PM of opportunism

NAGPUR MAY 1. The CPI today accused the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, of ``playing a game of opportunism'' and said the TDP and the National Conference (NC) should have voted against the NDA Government in the Lok Sabha during yesterday's Opposition-sponsored censure motion.

``The only agenda with Mr. Vajpayee is the number game. He is calculating the votes of his allies while assuring Cabinet berth to some who are supporting him from outside like Mamata Banerjee of the Trinamool Congress and Mayawati of the BSP. It is a game of opportunism,'' the CPI general secretary, A.B. Bardhan, told reporters at a press meet here.

``I do not know the logic of the TDP and the NC in staging a walk-out and abstaining from voting respectively,'' he said.

The vote under the motion was not a trial of strength of the ruling alliance and for that Opposition could have brought a no-confidence motion, Mr. Bardhan said.

He lashed out at the BJP firebrand leader, Uma Bharti, for her speech during the debate on the censure motion, describing it as ``below dignity and trivialising the whole issue.''

Mr. Bardhan questioned the `Rajdharma' of the Gujarat Chief Minister, Narendra Modi.

PTI

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