Anna’s supporters greet the PM with pro-Lokpal slogans during his visit to Golden Temple.
The New Year ushered in with black flags for prime minister Manmohan Singh as a group of Anna supporters hooted at him during his visit to the Golden Temple on Sunday.
The prime minister along with his wife Gursharan Kaur visited the Golden Temple to pay obeisance on the New Year day. As he was walking out of the shrine, a group of Anna supporters raised slogans against him and demanded that he go back. The protesters also raised pro-Anna and pro-Lokpal slogans waiving black flags.
“We do not want the PM, we want the Lokpal bill. If the PM cannot give us the Lokpal bill, he should resign,” said one of the Anna supporters.
The prime minister also prayed at the Akal Takht followed by a visit to the Durgiana temple.
Condemning the incident, the Congress said Team Anna should have shown black flags to BJP leaders who are responsible for not passing of the Lokpal Bill in the Rajya Sabha.
“The people who showed flags to the prime minister should go and show those flags to the leaders of the BJP who did not let the Lokpal bill pass in parliament. We have the majority in the Lok Sabha but we don’t have a majority in the Rajya Sabha and the BJP did not let it pass there,” Congress spokesperson Raashid Alvi said.
Team Anna, however, denied its members were involved in waving black flags to the prime minister and said it was the people’s own reaction. “I don’t think it was done at the behest of Team Anna but it is reflection of what people feel and think,” Team Anna member Shazia Ilmi said and added: “I guess this is the result of people’s mood as they want a stringent anti-corruption law and this is being not done.”
Former Karnataka lokayukta and Team Anna member Justice Santosh Hegde also suggested that the agitation did not have the blessings of Hazare.
“This is no way to treat the prime minister of a country or for that matter anybody whose leader who is leading a particular cause,” he said. “I don’t think Anna has (given) support nor permission to do that (protest),” he added.
However, another key Team Anna member Kiran Bedi defended that black flag protest.
“Showing black flags is within the law. Hence it is a legitimate protest,” the former IPS officer said when asked whether she approved of the protest.
— With agency inputs
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