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Journalism of Courage
Finance Minister P Chidambaram today sidestepped questions on the demands for removal of Union Minister Subodh Kant Sahai,who is embroiled in a controversy over allocation of a coal block in Jharkhand.
“It is unfair on your part to expect me to comment on a colleague. Sahai has responded…It is for the Prime Minister to weigh facts..it is not correct for me to comment on a colleague,” Chidambaram said.
He was replying to questions on whether he sees a conflict of interest in Sahai writing a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh,seeking allocation of coal blocks to a company having connection with his brother,and why the tourism minister should not step down.
BJP had produced a letter written by Sahai to the Prime Minister seeking his “personal intervention” for allocation of two coal blocks to SKS Ispat and Power Limited,which has his younger brother Sudhir Kumar Sahai as an “honourary executive director”.
Though Sahai had accepted that the letter was written by him,he ruled out resigning from the government.
Chidambaram also declined to comment on AICC general secretary Digvijay Singh’s remarks suggesting political ambition of CAG Vinod Rai behind the controversial report of the national audit body.
Asked whether Congress sees politics behind the issue,he said the “non-functioning of Parliament is a political problem”.
Chidambaram said President Pranab Mukherjee,when he was finance minister,had aptly remarked that the business of CAG was to find faults and to tell what went wrong.
However,there was nothing wrong on a debate on the CAG report,he said.
“Why there should not be a debate on the CAG report? …Judgements of Supreme Court are also criticised,” the Finance Minister said.
Dismissing any comparison between coal block allocation issue and Bofors pay-offs controversy,Finance Minister P Chidambaram today said “2012 is not 1989”.
“2012 is not 1989. Do not draw such comparisons”,Chidambaram said at the AICC media briefing when asked whether the Opposition was trying to re-enact a Bofors-like scenario.
The opposition had resigned en masse in 1989 following CAG report on the Bofors issue ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
Chidambaram said the chief prosecutor in the Bofors case had finally said Rajiv Gandhi was not at all involved in it.
“It was a complete rebuff to the stance taken by the Opposition in Parliament.”
Though BJP has not spoken or indicated of its intention to go in for mass resignation from the Lok Sabha to force early election,it has threatened to launch a nationwide “Bofors-like campaign” once the monsoon session of Parliament is over.
Speaking to reporters last week,BJP spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain had said this time his party will put up a fight against Congress which will be “more fierce” than the one seen during the Bofors scam.
