First, Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde advised political leaders to keep out of Uttarakhand in the midst of relief and rescue operations. Now, his party men want top BJP leaders to explain their absence from the flood-hit State!
The provocation was a tweet from leader of Opposition Sushma Swaraj seeking dismissal of Uttarakhand Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna for inept handling of disaster management. Sushma’s comment opened a floodgate of reactions from the Congress men, who triggered a major war of words by questioning why leaders like Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley did not visit Uttarakhand. In the process, the Congress leaders forgot what Shinde preached not too many days ago.
“I am sorry to say that the Government in Uttarakhand has not been able to rise to the occasion. They ought to be dismissed for being inept and incompetent. Unfortunately, the Government in Delhi has also failed to provide the requisite leadership,” Sushma wrote on micro-blogging site Twitter.
Sushma was also quick to respond to a poser by Congress leaders. “We did not go to Uttarakhand because the Home Minister made a public statement that our visit will hamper the rescue effort. He went to the extent of saying that nobody, including himself, was allowed to land anywhere. The truth is that I woke you up about the scale of tragedy when I spoke to Home Minister on June 18 and tweeted about this,” she said.
She lamented that when the Opposition tried to enforce accountability, “you call it politics”. “We will not allow you (Government) this escape route to hide your failures. All rescue operations have been done by the Army, Air Force and the ITBP. They have done this at the cost of their lives. I salute them,” she further wrote.
Another tweet from her reads, “What has your State Government doneIJ Nothing! The living are starving. The dead are being robbed. And you are patting your back. Those who cannot govern in a crisis do not deserve to be in the Government even for a day.”
Reacting to Sushma’s attack, Congress General Secretary Ajay Maken rejected the demand for Bahuguna’s dismissal and lamented that the natural calamity was being used for political opportunism. He said the State Government has done satisfactory work in such a devastating calamity. Maken said that the Centre and Congress is doing it and the Opposition should also set up relief camps to help the affected people.
launching a counter-offensive against the BJP on Twitter, Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari said: “H’onble lOP’s have mind space to critique Govt proposals on CBI autonomy yet to be placed before SC but no time to visit U’khand. Did anyone see lOPs in both Houses express sympathy/visit disaster hit U’khand.”
“The BJP’s quixotic logic is to salute the Army, Air Force, paramilitary but assail Govt. last when I read Constitution all these were part of Govt & deployed by Govt,” Manish added. Congress General Secretary Digvijay Singh tweeted, “For Sushma Swaraj, ‘R&R’, rehabilitation & resettlement, only means resignation & resignation.”