Coalgate impasse: NDA protests in Parliament complex, targets PM
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) on Friday staged protest inside the Parliament complex against the ruling Congress Party for wasting the entire Monsoon Session of Parliament over the coal blocks allocation scam.
BJP spokesperson Prakash Javadekar had earlier blamed the Congress Party for wasting the Parliament's time in the Monsoon Session by failing to cancel the allotted coal blocks and conducting an impartial probe into the scam.
"This is to protest against the government's refusal to accept the legitimate demand for an impartial probe and cancellation of all the allotments," said Javadekar.
"It is the Congress party that is wasting the Parliaments session because it is the country's legitimate demand, the demand of the majority of the house that there should be an impartial probe and the fraudulent coal blocks allotted be cancelled. But it is the Congress party that has taken this stubborn stand to not accept this legitimate demand. They are to blame for the deadlock in Parliament," he added.
The coal scandal has dominated this session of Parliament after the CAG report said that the under-priced sales of coalfields would have cost the national exchequer as much as 33 billion dollars in lost revenues.
The BJP is demanding the resignation of Manmohan Singh since he headed the Coal Ministry between 2006 and 2009, when many of the sales occurred.
However, Singh had rejected the CAG's observations as 'misleading' and 'flawed', and blamed the opposition parties for thwarting the efforts of his government to bring a policy of competitive bidding.
Singh also ruled out any possibility of quitting the top post despite the BJP firm on its demand for his resignation over the coal blocks allocation issue.
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