BJP, TMC, CPM attack Congress in Lok Sabha on centre-state relations

NEW DELHI: An isolated Congress faced the ire of friends and foes in the Lok Sabha on Monday during a debate on Centre-state relations.

Sparks flew in the House as an angry member of the Trinamool Congress told Congress that the focus of the debate should not be Centre versus states.

"The debate should be on improving Centre-state relations," said Trinamool member Kalyan Banerjee while interrupting Congress' Manish Tewari. The debate remained inconclusive. The Trinamool Congress is yet to get its turn to speak on the subject in the House.

Congress came under attack from BJP and CPM, which accused the UPA government of treading on the states' domain. The Opposition parties referred to the NCTC, which was opposed by 10 chief ministers, including Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Bannerjee. The other chief ministers resisting NCTC include Naveen Patnaik of Odisha, Nitish Kumar of Bihar, Jayalalithaa of Tamil Nadu and Gujarat's Narendra Modi.

"The mindset of Congress has always been against democratic principles and is always inclined towards dynastic rule of one family. The degradation of the Centre-state relations under Congress governments is because of this mentality - of the family, by the family and for the family," BJP's Ananth Kumar said.

He alleged that the UPA government was blocking legislations sent for President's assent by BJP-ruled states like Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan.

CPM's Basudeb Acharia, who initiated the debate, said there was no need for the post of governor unless the government accepted recommendations of the Sarkaria Commission that a list of three eminent persons be sent to the President of which one will be nominated as governor.

The Sarkaria Commission's recommendation was "no person who is active in politics should be appointed as Governor". He also challenged the Centre's claim on "doling" funds to states saying in 2004-05 Rs 3,37,000 was spent by the state governments all put together, while the Centre spent Rs 2,42,000 crore.