Opposition parties on Thursday joined hands to hit out at the Government for spreading ‘falsehood’ with claims that there was a consensus between political parties to bring a Bill to nullify the Supreme Courts judgement on convicted lawmakers.
Both BJP and the left claimed they were opposed to the Bill and the subsequent Ordinance that Government promulgated.
“We said the Ordinance was immoral, illegal and unconstitutional. We opposed the Bill. We opposed the Ordinance. What Cong is spreading since morning is complete falsehood,” leader of Opposition in lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj wrote on Twitter. The senior BJP leader claimed “four choices were placed before us” but no consensus could emerge.
“After the (all party) meeting P Chidambaram and Kamal Nath both told me that we should send all four options to Standing Committee for thorough deliberation. After Bill was introduced in Rajya Sabha, Kapil Sibal met Arun (Jaitley) and me in my chamber and we made our opposition very categoric and clear,” Swaraj said.
The former Union Minister said she told Sibal that the Bill was wrong and unconstitutional. “It was because of our opposition that the Bill was referred to the Standing Committee. And when the Ordinance was promulgated, we voiced our opposition on day one and requested the President not to sign the Ordinance,” she wrote on the micro-blogging site.
Her Rajya Sabha counterpart Arun Jaitley said, “My own understanding, upon reading of Section 8(4) of the amendment which was being proposed, was that such a provision would suffer from the vice of unconstitutionality which the original Section 8(4) suffers. I had conveyed this myself to the law Minister.”
Jaitley claimed Swaraj and he categorically informed the Government that they were opposed to the passage of this amendment to the Representation of People’s Act and in view of a divided opinion the Government informed the BJP that this was being referred to a Standing Committee.
Senior CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury also accused the Government of indulging in “mischief” and carrying out “selective propaganda” on the issue of controversial ordinance on disqualification of convicted lawmakers.
“This is mischief. Selective propaganda is being done by the Government attributing some opinions to me,” Yechury he said when asked about the minutes of the meeting which have been circulated to the media.
He also said that no minutes of the meeting have been circulated to the MPs who had participated in it. “As far as the CPI(M) is concerned, our position on the issue has been in the public domain,” he added.