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23rd July, 2008
NEW DELHI: India’s main opposition party on Tuesday demanded the resignation of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh over allegations the government was bribing lawmakers to survive a vote of confidence in parliament.
The demand came as a crucial debate descended into chaos when opposition MPs started waving around large bundles of cash they said had been paid to them in bribes.
Officials in parliament said the speaker, Somnath Chatterjee, had called in Delhi’s police chief to investigate the claims.
The confidence vote, however, was set to go ahead at 6:00 pm (1230 GMT), they said.
“Over the last three or four days, there has been pressure on our MPs to take money to either abstain or vote for the government, and this has been done by the Congress and their supporters,” Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Rajnath Singh told reporters.
“Now that it has been exposed, the prime minister of this country should resign his post. This scandal has lowered the dignity of our parliament,” he said, adding the party had video evidence of money changing hands.
“Never in the history of our parliament has such a shameful and revolting scandal unfolded,” he told AFP.
The stormy scenes forced the speaker to adjourn the session to restore order ahead of a confidence vote that will decide the fate of India’s coalition government and a controversial nuclear energy deal with the United States.
BJP lawmaker Ashok Argal interrupted proceedings by producing bags stuffed with notes he said amounted to 30 million rupees (715,000 dollars).
He alleged the money had been given to him to abstain from voting and help Singh’s government survive. Two other BJP lawmakers levelled similar allegations.
State television’s coverage of the debate was immediately interrupted and images of Mother Teresa were broadcast instead.
A spokesman from the ruling Congress party, Rajeev Shukla, immediately rejected the allegations.
“What is the evidence to suggest that the Congress has given the money?” he said, adding that Argal—having apparently accepted the bribe—would himself “become liable to criminal proceedings.”
Another Congress spokesman said the allegations were made because the BJP knew it could not topple the government.
Marxist party leader Prakash Karat said the incident was “shameful for our democracy.”
“Practically every member of parliament has been approached with offers of money and inducements,” he alleged.
The special parliament session and vote was triggered after a bloc of left-wing and communist parties withdrew support for Singh in protest over the deal with Washington, designed to bring India into the global loop of nuclear commerce.
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