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Journalism of Courage
The BJP is mooting a no-confidence motion against the UPA Government, and the issue will figure prominently in the NDA meeting scheduled for Monday. “We will discuss a no-confidence motion against the UPA Government in the NDA meeting,” BJP deputy leader in the Lok Sabha Vijay Kumar Malhotra told The Indian Express.
After having to bite the dust in the July 22 trust vote, that was also marred by large-scale defections from within its ranks, the BJP is keen to try out every possible measure to put the UPA Government on the backfoot. The BJP is also discussing if a no-trust motion should be introduced by a “third party like the TDP” that will bring the entire non-UPA parties on one platform. “After the July 22 setback, we’ll see if the ‘cash-for-vote-scandal tapes’ can be used to mobilise the entire opposition, including the Left,” said a senior BJP leader.
Various NDA allies, however, don’t share the BJP’s enthusiasm for a no-trust vote. Allies like the JD(U), the Shiv Sena and the Biju Janata Dal are likely to talk about the “futility of such an exercise” immediately after the UPA Government secured a vote of confidence, in Monday’s meeting. The constitutional position, though, says expert Subhash C Kashyap, doesn’t prevent a party from moving a no-confidence motion. “The confidence motion was discussed as an ordinary motion. So, constitutionally there’s no bar for a party on bringing a no-trust vote, though the final decision rests with the Speaker,” he told this paper.
The BJP will also discuss the “dropping” of four members — Shiv Sena’s Anant Geete, Biju Janata Dal’s Braj Kishore Tripathi, CPI’s Gurudas Dasgupta and Nationalist Congress Party’s Srinivas Patil — from the “Committee to inquire into misconduct of MPs” for a new seven-member ad hoc committee to probe the “cash-for-votes scandal”.
The BJP argues that with the Left withdrawing support to the UPA Government, the ruling alliance has been reduced to a minority in the 11-member panel, but in the newly-constituted panel, “it’s the UPA that has an upper hand”. All the seven members of the new panel figured on the “misconduct panel”. A BJP ally, however, had a different take. “It’s the Speaker’s prerogative to constitute a panel, but we’ll discuss the issue in the meeting,” said the leader of an NDA constituent.
The NDA meeting could also call for referring the case of Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh and Congress leader Ahmed Patel — who have been named along with another SP leader Reoti Raman Singh in the BJP’s complaint to the Lok Sabha Speaker — to the Rajya Sabha ethics panel “since they happen to be members of the Upper House”.
