New Delhi: Apparently mindful of its depleted number in Parliament after DMK`s pull out, Congress on Wednesday treaded cautiously amid the political controversy over yesterday`s attack on Mamata Banerjee as its two former allies CPI(M) and Trinamool Congress fought it out in West Bengal.
Terming the attack on Banerjee and her colleagues by SFI activists in Delhi as "extremely unfortunate", I&B Minister Manish Tewari said "whether it is our friends from the Left, or our friends in Trinamool Congress or political parties across the length and breadth of this country, everybody needs to exercise restraint".
"Whatever happened between the Left and the TMC, neither central government nor UPA has anything to do with this. It is a very sad thing. We have already expressed our regret that Sudipto Gupta- an SFI activist - is no more with us," he said.
Asked if there could be difficulty in smooth functioning of Parliament due to the incident, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kamal Nath said "we`ll see".
The seccond half of the budget session of Parliament begins on April 22 and the government has to pass a number of crucial bills.
At the AICC briefing, Congress spokesperson Renuka Chowdhary said "we have nothing to do with the issue. It`s a matter between Left and her,".
She was responding to questions about the violent protests both by CPI-M as well as TMC workers in West Bengal today after the yesterday`s attack on Banerjee and her colleagues here.
Party`s in-charge for West Bengal Shakeel Ahmed said "two wrongs do not make a right" condemning the violence engaged in "both by the TMC and CPI-M workers" in West Bengal today.
While he said that the death of the SFI Sudipto should be thoroughly probed and the guilty punished, he added " but this cannot be a pretext to adopt violent means in a democracy."
PTI
