New Delhi: After backing the Delhi Services Bill, the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) Tuesday targeted the Opposition over the move to bring a no-confidence motion against the Centre, saying it “defies political sense” and would only allow Prime Minister Narendra Modi to “push the Congress through the shredder”.
The BJD, which insists of maintaining politically equidistant from the BJP and the Congress, said that its supremo and Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik does not believe in picking “needless” fights with the Centre as “disruptive politics” has never paid dividends. Formed in 1997, the BJD had parted ways with the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance in 2009.
At the debate on the no-confidence motion in the Lok Sabha, BJD MP Pinaki Misra said the foundation of the Patnaik-led party is “anti-Congressism”. “We were born on 25th of December 1997 on the basis of opposing the Congress party’s corrupt rule in Odisha at that point of time… Any motion brought by the Congress party, goes without saying, is out of question for the BJD to support,” Misra said.
The support of nine MPs each of the BJD and the YSR Congress Party was instrumental Monday in the smooth passage of the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Bill, 2023 in the Rajya Sabha where the Modi government does not enjoy a majority.
As the government enjoys a brute majority in the Lok Sabha, the BJD’s position on the no-confidence motion assumes significance politically, if not numerically, particularly at a time efforts are underway in the opposition ranks to strengthen the newly minted INDIA alliance to take on the BJP in 2024.
Misra stressed apart from the BJD’s avowed anti-Congress credentials, there are many other “compelling reasons” to oppose the “misplaced” no-confidence motion. Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s remarks, made during an event in Odisha last week, that Patnaik is a “popular” CM, also found mention in the BJD MP’s speech.
“Shah very graciously said that it is without doubt that Naveen Patnaik is India’s most popular chief minister. And he also praised Mr Patnaik for cooperative federalism and constructive cooperation with the Centre that he has demonstrated in his last 24 years as CM,” Misra said.
In 2019 ahead of the Odisha polls, Shah had called the BJD government a “burnt out transformer”. The same year, Misra had defeated BJP’s Sambit Patra at Puri in the general election.
Praising Shah for giving an “exceptionally detailed analysis” at the all-party meeting on Manipur, the BJD’s parliamentary party leader said “legacy issues” lie behind the ongoing unrest there. The “ill-advised” order of the Manipur High Court, which suggested that options be explored to grant ST status to Meiteis, aggravated the situation, he added.
“What has happened in Manipur is heartrending. All parties should speak in one voice. Every party should give constructive suggestions rather than blaming the Centre on what is clearly a legacy issue,” the BJD MP said.
Misra said the BJD fights the BJP “tooth-and-nail” during elections, but believes in working together when governance kicks in after the electoral season is over. “He (Patnaik) does not believe in needlessly picking quarrels with the Centre, it does not pay. We are a regional party, in the kind of fiscal architecture our constitution has provided, it is impossible to continuously bicker and fight with the Centre and survive as a model fiscal state as it is today,” he said.
Misra said that the Congress is “adept at cutting their nose to spite their face”.
“They know everytime the PM has got up to speak on the floor of the House, and I think his worst political adversaries will recognise the fact that he is a peerless orator, he pushes the Congress party through the shredder,” he said, adding that it is for the people to decide whether Modi was right in choosing not to speak on Manipur.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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