Parliament deadlock continues, both Houses adjourned

Zeenews Bureau

New Delhi: Parliament continued to remain stalled for the third consecutive day on Thursday, with opposition members led by the BJP trooping to the Well of the House demanding PM’s resignation over the CAG report on coal blocks allocation. Both the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha were adjourned till 12 noon amid slogan shouting. An adamant BJP has been persistent with its demand that nothing less than PM Manmohan Singh`s resignation would satisfy them. It disrupted proceedings in both the Houses on Tuesday and Wednesday as well. The BJP on Wednesday raised the level of confrontation with the government with its members walking out of the Joint Parliamentary Committee on 2G scam when its demand for summoning the Prime Minister and Finance Minister P Chidambaram and key PMO officials was not heeded too. Meanwhile, amid talks of a divide within the NDA over disruption of Parliament JD-U leader Sharad Yadav said they are with the BJP on the issue. Yadav, who is also the NDA convener, had yesterday favoured discussions in the two Houses on the coal block allocation issue. The BJP has gone on the offensive on its demand for Prime Minister`s resignation on the ground that former telecom minister A Raja and Dayanidhi Maran had to quit after 2G scam surfaced. Trashing BJP`s demand, Congress spokesperson Rashid Alvi said, "There is no question of the Prime Minister resigning... Prime Minister`s image is very clean...Nobody turns an accused or delinquent only by BJP`s allegations". With the BJP insisting on his resignation over faulty coal blocks allocation, Prime Minister Singh is ready to make a strong rebuttal of the charges, Congress sources said. They said the Prime Minister would seek to turn the tables on the opposition in his statement by pointing out that state governments of non-United Progressive Alliance constituents had given in writing that there should not be an auction of the coal blocks. "The Prime Minister is ready with a reply," a party leader said. (With Agency inputs)