With the Government facing heat over coal and 2G spectrum scams, Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh on Monday targeted the judiciary accusing it of belittling institutions.
“By calling CBI a parrot in cage, then a Central Administrative (Tribunal) Bench in Bangalore calling the IB a chicken... Now I have a question to the people in general. Are we not belittling our institutionsIJ That’s it,” Digvijay tweeted.
But he appears to have forgotten that in the past he along with other Congress leaders have targeted the CAG after it gave a scathing report against the Government in the two scams.
Singh’s comment immediately drew the ire of Opposition with the BJP saying that instead of blaming the judiciary which is just trying to ensure fair investigation in a massive case of corruption, the Congress general secretary should learn and understand why so many scams have happened in the UPA Government.
“If the morale of the CBI has been downgraded, it is only because of the rank abuse of the CBI by the Government. CBI was deliberately not allowed to take up fair investigation. Otherwise the Minister of his Government would not have sought to weaken the import of the CBI’s entire investigations in the coalgate. Why it was done because the Prime Minister was involved in the coalgate,” BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad said.
Even the Congress distanced itself from the controversial comment leaving it to Digvijay — who has made a number of controversial statements in the past also including his latest on two power centres not being good for the UPA Government— to explain his opinion.
“Digvijay Singh is a senior leader. Since he is such a big leader, if he has said something he must have said it with due deliberation. Only he can explain what he has said,” Congress spokesman Meem Afzal said.
But Digvijay himself remained unapologetic. “I want you to respond. I will request you to try and get access to all those who are calling our institutions chicken or parrot. You should take reaction from them also,” he told reporters.
He, however, later tried to do the damage control by saying that the Supreme Court has to be respected and that he had the greatest regard for judiciary.
“And in my political career, I have never sort of belittled the judiciary. But then my only request to the judiciary is that off-the-cuff observations unfortunately create headlines and at the same time the person against whom the remarks are made doesn’t have the opportunity to appeal against these observations,” he said.