Sushma Swaraj gave a mouthful to Congress
The takeaway from the recently concluded Monsoon Session of Parliament, washed out in the ruckus the Congress-led Opposition created, is Minister for External Affairs Sushma Swaraj's robust attack on Wednesday on the Congress and its dynasty. When she rose to speak as part of a debate on her alleged links with former Indian Premier league chief lalit Modi, the Congress must have thought she would be on the defensive, given the wide and negative media coverage she had received on the subject and the relentless attack the Opposition had sustained over the weeks.
But Ms Swaraj turned the tables on her opponents by not just effectively refuting every allegation the Congress had levelled, but also taking the fight right into the Nehru-Gandhi backyard by raking up the escape of Ottavio Quattrocchi and Warren Anderson of Union Carbide, respectively connected with the Bofors controversy and the Bhopal gas tragedy in which close to 15,000 people had lost their lives. That must have taken the Congress by surprise because it had least imagined those ghosts would be revived at this moment.
Ms Swaraj left the party squirming when she linked the fate of the two men from India with the support from the Congress, especially Rajiv Gandhi, who was then the Prime Minister. Ms Swaraj had clearly come well-prepared, and her response was structured around the three barbs directed at her: Conflict of interest, quid pro quo and help by stealth. The first two charges she dismissed with the fact that her lawyer-husband had never appeared for Mr lalit Modi in the contentious passport case and that her daughter had earned not a rupee from being part of the former IPl chief's legal team (she was listed ninth, as a junior, in a list of 11 lawyers). She then rubbed it into the Congress by pointing out that conflict of interest was during Mr P Chidambaram's reign as Union Minister for Finance, when his wife became a lawyer for the Income Tax department, which came under Mr Chidambaram's jurisdiction. Taking the fight straight to the Nehru-Gandhi camp, she spoke of the quid pro quo behind allowing Anderson to flee the country after the Bhopal tragedy. Ms Swaraj recalled the presidential pardon given by the US President to the jailed son of a Congress's first family confidant, which came months after Anderson's return to the US.
As for helping Mr Modi surreptitiously, Ms Swaraj laid bare the documents and reminded Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi of the stealth that went into the escape of both Quattrocchi and Anderson. In sum, regardless of the counter-attacks that senior Congress leaders including Mr Rahul Gandhi responded with, the day belonged to Ms Swaraj, who succeeded in making her point despite the raucous sloganeering by a bunch of Congress members throughout her speech.
With the Monsoon Session ending and Ms Swaraj having the last word, the Congress must introspect on what it has achieved by its irresponsible conduct. It stalled the Goods and Services Tax Bill, so essential to the country's economic growth, and created an environment so that crucial legislations including that of amendments to the juvenile justice Act could not be taken up. It has cut off its nose to spite the Modi Government's face.