Govt hits back at Congress over sabotage remark

New Delhi: A day after Congress president Sonia Gandhi accused the Modi government of “sabotaging” Parliament’s winter session, parliamentary affairs minister Ananth Kumar on Tuesday alleged that the Opposition party was levelling allegations out of desperation and frustration as it would be routed in assembly elections in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh. The Winter Session is generally convened in the third week of November and continues till the third week of December. “Usually, care is taken not to overlap the parliament session with assembly elections. It has been done so in the past also....The writing on the wall is loud and clear that the Congress will lose both Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat assembly polls and now out of frustration, it is making such wild accusations,” said Mr Kumar adding that the Congress speaking about democracy considering its past history is paradoxical. The minister also cited precedents during the UPA rule to reject the Congress’ allegations of “delay” and said the government will soon meet to decide the session’s date. He accused the opposition party of suffering from “selective amnesia” as in 2008 and 2013 also the Winter Session was held in December.

Taking a dig at the Congress, another Union minister Ravishankar Prasad said “It is really surprising to see that Congress is so keen to uphold the sanctity of the Parliament. But we want to know from the Congress how many sessions Rahul Gandhi has been present in the House.