NEW DELHI: India's opposition vowed on Wednesday to block parliamentary proceedings
until the prime minister resigned over a coal scandal, raising the prospect of
more legislative deadlock and stalled reforms.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was
implicated by the national auditor in a report published last Friday which
suggested the government had lost out on billions of dollars of revenue by
gifting away coal mining rights.
Singh, who has seen his
reputation as "Mr Clean" damaged by a string of scandals in his
second term in government, served as acting coal minister from 2004-2009.
Senior opposition leader Arun
Jaitley said his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) would obstruct parliamentary
proceedings until the 79-year-old Singh took personal responsibility and
stepped down.
"Parliamentary
obstructionism is normally to be avoided, but in rare cases parties do adopt
it," Jaitley told the Times Now television channel in an interview as both
houses of parliament were adjourned for the second day in row.
"The way forward is that the
prime minister must accept his culpability. The reason is very obvious. For
five out of the eight years (analysed by the auditor)... he himself was the
coal minister," Jaitley added.
The disruption in parliament
comes as India's economy is badly faltering, with investors and business
leaders looking for decisive action from the under-fire government to restore
confidence and spur expansion.
Quarterly economic growth slumped
to its lowest level in nine years in the first three months of the year and
more bad GDP data are expected at the end of this month.
In 2010, the BJP and opposition
allies blocked an entire session of parliament, forcing adjournments for 22
business days in a row which meant no legislation was passed.
"BJP goes for broke, wants
PM to quit," headlined The Times of India on its front page on Wednesday,
underlining how the opposition had staked its credibility on removing Singh.
President of the ruling Congress
party, Sonia Gandhi, is expected to stand steadfastly by her choice as premier,
who has weathered repeated calls from the opposition to resign previously.
The report by the Comptroller and
Auditor General (CAG) said private companies had made windfall gains of about
$33.4 billion since 2004 after being given mining rights via a process that
"lacked transparency and objectivity".
The government had known of the
huge profits for private operators, but had failed to introduce an open bidding
process that would have brought in revenue for the national exchequer, the CAG
said.
The report did not contain any
allegations of corruption or criminal practices and the government accused the
CAG, an independent constitutional body, of publishing spurious figures.
"I think as and when this
case is investigated more glaring facts will come out," Jaitley claimed.
Parliamentary Affairs Minister
Pawan Kumar Bansal told reporters the government was ready for a discussion
about the CAG report in parliament and accused the BJP of running away from an
open debate.
"Why are they even opposing
a discussion? They are scared about the fact that when this discussion takes
place, skeletons will come out," he said.
The government has said its
efforts to introduce open bidding for coal resources were held up by opposition
from some state governments, notably ones run by the BJP.
The "coalgate" scandal
centres on the opaque system of gifting away valuable coal resources to
companies, with little known about why politicians and bureaucrats favoured
some operators over others.
In 2010, Singh's government was
hit by a huge scandal over the murky sale of mobile phone spectrum, which led
to the arrest of a minister accused of taking kickbacks in return for favours.
- AFP/cc
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