New Delhi--The opposition having mounted a fresher, stronger attack on the land bill, the BJP on Tuesday asked its MPs to continue an aggressive campaign for the bill and “expose” the Congress. Members, in turn, informed the leadership that support for the bill is growing on the ground, sources present at the meeting said.
The day after Rahul Gandhi attacked the land legislation in the Lok Sabha, the BJP held a parliamentary party meeting where Parliamentary Affairs Minister M Venkaiah Naidu provided members with “facts” and “realities” and asked them to attack the Congress and “expose” it at every stage.
With the opposition having united with the Congress, and with the ruling BJP in a minority in the Rajya Sabha, the government needs to work at mustering the numbers to clear the bill that would replace the re-promulgated ordinance on land acquisition.
Referring to the Congress description of the ordinance route for the bill as “murder of democracy”, Naidu told reporters after the meeting: “The Congress criticising the ordinance route is like the devil quoting the scriptures. Their record is worse. They have issued ordinances umpteen times; 456 ordinances were issued in the last 50 years.”
“There is a limit to misinformation. Falsehood cannot become truth by repeating it 10 times. Before criticising us for murder of democracy, when you imposed Emergency and put lakhs of people behind bars and stifled the media, what is it called?” he said.
Naidu attacked the Left too. “The CPM-supported United Front regime issued 77 ordinances, three ordinances per month. Bills passed were only 61, and 77 ordinances were issued by the United Front government, which was supported by the Communist Party, which is taking objection to the issuance of ordinances that was done after wider consultations after taking stakeholders into confidence,” he said.
Indian Express
