BJP ‘chargesheets’ UPA’s ‘list of achievements’

“The stark truth about four years of the government is its failure on all fronts, compounded by its betrayal of the common man in whose name the Congress had sought votes,” BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad said.

The BJP came out with its parallel ‘list of achievements’ of the Government on a day the UPA celebrated completion of four years in office with the Prime Minister hosting a dinner to coalition partners and Left allies.

In a sarcastic remark, Prasad said while ministers and leaders of the UPA attend the grand dinner, crores of ordinary Indians will be eating less than their normal meagre intake because skyrocketing prices have eaten into their per capita food consumption.

“The UPA Government’s failure to check spiralling inflation, which is robbing the paltry earnings of the common man, has imperiled their economic and food security,” he said, while noting that apart from the poor, price rise has also hit the urban middle class.

The ‘list of achievements’ came a day after the party identified stifling inflation, rise in terror attacks, collapse of agricultural sector and brakes on infrastructure development as the legacy of four years of UPA ‘misrule’.

On the internal security front, the BJP accused the Government of being ‘terrorist-friendly’ by repealing POTA, dithering on the execution of Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru and assuring protection for illegal migrants.

“Now the Congress’ politics of minorityism has acquired a distinctly anti-national hue with Home Minister Shivraj Patil seeking protection for Afzal by invoking his government’s plea to Pakistan for clemency for Sarabjit Singh,” Prasad said.

He said the Home Minister by his statement on Afzal has given Pakistan an opportunity to intervene in India’s internal affairs and that too on the question of national security.

The party also attacked the UPA Government on the issue of tainted ministers, saying the UPA regime has disgraced itself by rewarding criminals with ministerial posts at the Centre.

Another issue which figured prominently in the BJP chargesheet was ‘devaluation of democratic institutions’ with reference to the Election Commission, CBI and the office of the Governor.

It raked up the Navin Chawla issue, controversy over Ottavio Quattrocchi, imposition of President’s Rule in Bihar in Goa and easing out of P Venugopal as AIIMS director to attack the Government.

“The worst case of institutional devaluation has been that of the office of the Prime Minister,” it said.