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Scindia flays BJP for using underhand means in Goa

Onkar Singh in New Delhi

The deputy leader of the Congress party in the Lok Sabha and general secretary in charge of Goa, Maharashtra and Bihar, Madhavrao Scindia accused the Bharatiya Janata Party leadership of trying to destabilise the Congress-ruled states and install new governments there. He was speaking to newsmen at the Press Club of India this afternoon.

"Five months ago Goa had a new government led by Luizinho Falerio. For the first time in fifteen years the people of Goa had given a clear mandate and we -- both Dr Manmohan Singh and myself -- talked to each and every Congress legislator before declaring that Luizinho would be the next chief minister. At that time the present chief minister Francisco Sardinha had just one supporter. Soon after the ministry was installed we started getting information that the BJP, which had been rejected by the people of Goa, had started making bids to buy the Congress legislators. Some people with vested interests and high ambitions fell into their trap and raised a banner of revolt against the state party leadership. Interestingly, out of a total of twenty five as many as fourteen are ministers in the new cabinet including all the eleven who had gone with Sardinha," Scindia explained.

He flayed the BJP leadership for using underhand means to grab power in many states. "This is not good for democracy. The BJP had tried very hard to win the election in Goa but it did not succeed. Hence there is desperation in the BJP rank and file in the state," he added.

He disclosed that the Congress president Sonia Gandhi had merely expressed optimism when she said that the Congress government would survive the vote of confidence in Goa. ''Every party has a right to be optimistic till the last minute. Things did not work out because the dissidents had put three conditions for returning to the Congress party. They asked for the removal of Falerio. The second condition was that all those who had revolted against the chief minister would be made ministers and the third and last condition was that Falerio would be removed as the state party president as well. These conditions were not acceptable to us. No self-respecting party would accept them," said Scindia.

He lashed out at some of the senior ministers of the Vajpayee government for trying to politicise the Orissa tragedy. "While the central government has acted with some sense of responsibility, some of the ministers in the present government have been trying to make political capital out of a human tragedy," he said.

He denied that there is a move to replace Orissa Chief Minister Giridhar Gamang. "You cannot hold Gamang responsible for a human tragedy of extraordinary magnitude. The super cyclone is a natural calamity and we cannot say he is responsible for it. The state government has been handling the relief and rescue operations very well. We are obliged to some of the state governments like Goa, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Punjab, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, etc who have been of immense help to the tragedy stricken people of Orissa," he said.

He wanted to know what prevented the Union government from declaring cyclone-hit Orissa as a National Calamity of Severity. "I don't understand the hesitation of the Vajpayee government in this respect. The tenth finance commission has clearly laid down guidelines for declaring the National Calamity of Severity on page 44 of its report. The Union government says that it has released over Rs 6500 million for assistance to the state. Of this only Rs 2000 million is in the form of grants. The rest comes under various heads. The state government is expected to pay back these loans with an interest of nine per cent by March 30, 2000. How can you do this to Orissa? The United Nations Children's Emergency Fund had promised a huge relief fund but unfortunately not even one fifth of it has materialised so far. If we declare the Orissa tragedy as a National Calamity of Severity, we would be able to raise the profile of the tragedy and get help from international agencies. Several requests have been made to the Union government but it has so far not responded," he said with some feeling of dejection.

He admitted that Kalinga stadium was full of relief material and the same could not reach the people at the earliest for various reasons. "Sixty five per cent of the government staff had been hit during the cyclone. Naturally all of them had left for various districts to find out the fate of their near and dear ones. For fifteen days the state administration had come to a virtual standstill. Now the relief work is going on in full swing. It is an enormous task ahead for the Orissa government and we in the Congress party would do everything to ensure that the people of Orissa in their hour of crisis do not feel neglected," Scindia said.

Talking about the Bofors controversy, he said that his party had only a limited objective. The Congress party wants to ensure that the name of Rajiv Gandhi, which has been unfairly put in the Bofors chargesheet, is deleted. The party wants that the case should be carried to its logical end. The accused who are found guilty must be punished.

He denied that Subash Yadav, former deputy chief minister of Madhya Pradesh, has revolted against the leadership of Chief Minister Digvijay Singh. "He is merely taking up the problems of the farmers of the state. He agreed that his methods were wrong and he could have taken up the matter with the chief minister directly instead of taking to the streets,'' Scindia said.

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