Govt, Opposition end stalemate in Rajya Sabha over Modi's Manmohan remarks

Congress uses Jadhav issue to agree to a truce; also, Jaitley said Modi didn't mean to question Manmohan's commitment to India

The parliamentary impasse over Prime Minister Narendra Modi's comments about former prime minister Manmohan Singh during an election rally in Gujarat ended on Wednesday.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley stated in the Rajya Sabha that the PM did not question his predecessor's commitment to India. The Congress party accepted the "clarification" and stopped its disruption of the proceedings.

Proceedings of both the Houses had been adjourned repeatedly since the first day of the winter session on December 15 with the Congress demanding the PM apologise for alleging that Singh, former vice president M Hamid Ansari and others had met at a dinner to conspire at the behest of Pakistan to influence the Gujarat polls.

After Jaitley's statement in the Rajya Sabha and in a reference to suspended Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar's remarks on the PM, Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad said the Congress dissociated itself from any statement that any of its members had made against the stature of the PM during the recently concluded assembly polls to Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh.

According to sources within the Congress, the party's feedback was the public perception on the issue was that the party was prolonging its stalling of Parliament and not discussing other issues of import. Azad said the Congress felt it was letting the government escape accountability on several other issues, where it should ideally pin it down.

The party had been wanting an honourable exit to bring the issue to a closure, which was provided by the developments related to Kulbhushan Jadhav. Azad also said the Congress believed it should voice the anger among common people over the "inhuman" treatment meted out by Pakistan to Jadhav's mother and wife. "Pakistan has insulted not just Jadhav's mother and wife, but 1.3 crore billion people. We are a political party but first we are Indians," Azad said. He has moved a notice that the Rajya Sabha suspend its Question Hour on Thursday to take up a discussion on the issue.

The Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) reached a deal on the issue in the morning after Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu intervened, but the rest of the Opposition parties disrupted the Rajya Sabha proceedings before lunch to protest the comments by union minister Anantkumar Hegde. The Lok Sabha was also disrupted on the issue.

Trinamool Congress, Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samajwadi Party members trooped into the well of the Rajya Sabha to demand that Hegde either apologise for his comments questioning the Constitution or be sacked as a minister and an MP of the Lok Sabha. The government has sought a day's time. The Opposition, including the Congress, will protest on the issue on Thursday morning.

At 2pm on Wednesday, Jaitley, also the Leader of the House, said the PM in his speeches "did not question the commitment to this nation either by Dr Manmohan Singh, the former Prime Minister, or Hamid Ansari, the former Vice President". "Any such perception is completely erroneous. We hold these leaders in high esteem, as also their commitment to this nation," Jaitley said.

He said many statements had been made on all sides during the elections, and added that the government "does not want the stalemate as a result of this to continue". After Jaitley and then Azad's statements, Chairman Naidu thanked all members of the House for their cooperation in resolving the stalemate.