E-Paper
NDA makes exception, votes on Finance Bill
Opposition NDA is protesting UPA Govt's "hostile and vindictive" attitude.
The Opposition NDA on Monday broke its three-day boycott of Lok Sabha for a day to participate in the discussion and voting on the Finance Bill but would resume its boycott of Parliament indefinitely from Tuesday, protesting UPA government's "hostile and vindictive" attitude towards it.
The Opposition boycott of proceedings in Rajya Sabha would continue on Monday as well. The NDA MPs will not sign attendance registers in Lok Sabha on Monday, denying themselves allowances.
After a 90-minute meeting of the NDA Parliamentary Party chaired by former Prime Minister and alliance Chairman Atal Bihari Vajpayee, BJP Deputy Leader in Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj told reporters that the NDA Coordination Committee would meet again after the voting on the Finance Bill later in the day to chalk out their future course of action.
Swaraj said the decision to continue with the three-day boycott was taken as the UPA government "failed to come up with any satisfactory response" to break the impasse.
She described as a "mere formality" the Prime Minister's telephone calls to leaders of Opposition in both Houses urging them to reconsider their decision.
The meeting also adopted a resolution accusing the UPA of treating the Opposition as its "enemy" and of being "hostile and vindictive" towards it.
Maintaining that the matters "remained where they were", the resolution regretted that the framing of charges against a minister (Railway Minister Lalu Prasad) "does not disturb" the prime minister and he remained "insensitive" towards it.
"What matters to him (the prime minister) is to save his own chair," said the resolution read out to reporters by senior BJP leader Yashwant Sinha, which asked Manmohan Singh to judge for himself whether it was "morally tenable".
