Amid controversy over leakage of Liberhan Commission report, Congress today targeted the BJP saying the indictment of those responsible for the incident is very clear.
Amid controversy over leakage of Liberhan Commission report, Congress today targeted the BJP saying the indictment of those responsible for the incident is very clear.
"Perceptionally the indictment is very clear. Perceptionally the issue in the mind of people is already settled as far as guilt and culpability are concerned. BJP and its affiliates are responsible (for the demolition)," Congress spokesperson Manish Tewari told reporters here.
He said the events that culminated in the demolition of the mosque were played in "full public view".
To a question why the government was not placing the Commission report before the House immediately as demanded by the opposition, Tewari hoped the government will do it as soon as possible.
"The Commission gave its report to the government on June 30. It has to table the report in the Parliament within six months (December 30). Home minister has already said it will be placed before the expiry of six months. Let it be tabled then," he added.
Asked to comment on Rahul Gandhi's reported statement that had his father, former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi, been alive, the mosque would not have been demolished, Tewari said, "it is a reiteration of the fundamental values, tenets of secularism in which he and his family believes."
On the accountability for leakage of the report, he said, "I am not commenting on veracity of the report (that has been published) as the Commission report is not before Parliament. Till then we cannot treat it as official".
To a query whether the Liberhan Commission had given a clean chit to the then Congress prime minister Narsimha Rao, Tewari said, "we will respond to all these questions after the report is tabled in the House".
He also accused the opposition of "wasting" Parliament's time and said, "out of the total 23 sittings of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, the opposition wasted three days with its undemocrtic attitude."
He said the opposition has the power to raise issues which it thinks are important and protest against the government but this should be in Parliamentary and democratic manner.
"Lot of people are asking what is the use of Parliament, when it does not function," he said, asking the opposition to cooperate in allowing the two Houses to run.
Asked why it took the commission 17 years to submit a report, Tewari said, "... only Justice Liberhan can tell" adding that the government can be criticised if it fails to table the report in Parliament within six months of receiving it.
To a question against whom privilege motion, if any, will be brought out for the "leakage", Tewari said, "we admire the investigating skills of the media but leakage is a serious issue. Government will take cognisance of it."
Tewari rejected the assumption that government deliberately leaked the report to divide the opposition unity witnessed over the issue of sugarcane pricing, saying, "there are a million other ways in which a leakage can take place."
Replying to questions on the response of the then Congress government at the Centre for demolition of the mosque, a senior party leader said "every PM, every leader has a dilemma. The point is how the leader responds to it."
"What needs to be debated is how do you come out of the impasse in such a situation if it again arrives in future," he added.
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