New Delhi, Jul 23 (PTI) Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal on Tuesday took a swipe at the Centre over financial packages for Bihar and Andhra Pradesh in the budget, saying the government that is standing on “crutches” of JD(U) and TDP was compelled to benefit the two states.
He said the story of the Union Budget presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman was that it was a “faltering budget” of a “tottering government”.
“Remember that politically, this government is standing on crutches, crutches of two leaders in the states of Bihar and Andhra Pradesh. So they realise that without those crutches they cannot survive. So they need to benefit both Andhra as well as Bihar,” he said at a press conference here.
The government was “tottering” and helped by TDP’s N Chandrababu Naidu and JD(U)’s Nitish Kumar, so the benefit of the budget has gone to the two states, the former Union minister said.
“We are not against that as we believe that those in help should be given assistance,” he added.
Sibal also claimed that the BJP had “punished” the states where it had not done well in the Lok Sabha polls.
“Wherever they lost, they are angry. They did not give anything to UP. They also did not give anything to the states where elections are due — Haryana, Jharkhand and Maharashtra. Is there any enmity with these states? But they know that if they don’t give assistance to Bihar and Andhra (government will not survive),” he said.
First time, the budget speech began with states as if it were a political playing field, he said.
“Ten years have passed and they do not talk of ‘achche din’ now. They could not do anything for private investment as the economic situation is deteriorating everyday,” the Independent Rajya Sabha MP said.
“They have acknowledged that they could not create jobs and the apprenticeship scheme the Congress had talked about that has been brought,” he said.
Slamming the BJP, Sibal said people also know they cannot run a government.
They (BJP) will be defeated in the upcoming assembly polls in Haryana, Jharkhand and Maharashtra, Sibal claimed.
Presenting the Union Budget in Parliament, Sitharaman announced income tax relief for the middle class, a Rs 2 lakh crore outlay for job creation schemes over the next five years and a spending splurge for states run by her party’s new coalition partners as she unveiled Modi 3.0 government’s first budget after the general elections. PTI ASK ASK KVK KVK
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