Budget discussion: DMK says making 2G remarks does not behove PM

“Why should he refer to 2G? All the people connected to the 2G spectrum were falsely accused and they have come out unscathed. Then why should he mention it? They could not point anything against the persons who were falsely accused,” Baalu said, as other DMK MPs including A Raja and Dayandhi Maran backed him.

In his speech Modi cited various alleged scams involving 2G, coal allocation and the 2010 Commonwealth Games to target the Congress.The 2004-14 decade was the era of most scams in India after Independence, he said.

Baalu also attacked the government over the cut in MGNREGA funds. “World Bank economists had estimated that 1.6 per cent of the GDP should be provided to the scheme…Things are going from bad to worse,” he said.

He also raised the Adani row, accusing the Securities and Exchange Board of India of “sleeping over” the allegations of irregularities against the business group. Soon after Baalu spoke, the House was adjourned for the day for a lack of quorum, with very few MPs present in the treasury benches.

After the Opposition members pointed this out to Speaker Om Birla, he directed officials to ring the quorum bell to ensure presence of at least 55 members, which is 10 per cent of the total strength of the House. However, that did not happen and the House was adjourned.

Earlier, Congress MP Gaurav Gogoi also targeted the government, saying that unemployment was on the rise in the country along with poverty. “If we still need to provide free rice to 80 crore people, you can well imagine the enormity of the challenges we are faced with,” Gogoi said.

He also claimed that imports from China have gone up since 2014 while the trade deficit with the country has doubled. “The world is reducing its dependency on China and under the Modi government, India’s dependency is rising,” he alleged.