Cong refuse to take part in all-party meet called by Jaitley

A move to break the three-day-old deadlock in Parliament was a non-starter with Congress refusing to participate in an all-party meeting called by Leader of Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley today.
Jaitley was forced to abort the meeting after the main Opposition party kept its distance and refused to play ball.
"The solution to the deadlock in Parliament cannot be found in a meeting, but in action against a Union minister and two chief ministers," Leader of the Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad said when asked as to why he did not attend the meeting.
He said that he has regard for Jaitley and he would attend any meeting convened by him the day he resolves the deadlock by taking action against Sushma Swaraj, Vasundhara Raje and Shivraj Singh Chouhan.

Dismissing suggestions that there was no unity among the Opposition on the issue, Azad insisted that as far as the Rajya Sabha is concerned, leaders of the SP, CPI, CPI-M, BSP and JD-U have all demanded "resignations" of those involved in the Lalit Modi issue and Vyapam scam.
Government sources claimed Congress had initially shown its inclination to attend the meeting but later backed out.

"It is our job to reach out to the Opposition for the smooth conduct of Parliament. Congress is obviously not interested," said a Union minister, who declined to be named.
There was no point in going ahead with the meeting when the main Opposition was not attending it.

The rejection of the offer to sit for informal talks indicated that key Opposition parties are determined to continue stalling tactics in both houses of Parliament.
Government's Parliament managers reached out to Opposition leaders such as Ghulam Nabi Azad of the Congress, CPI-M general secretary Sitaram Yechury, JD-U's Sharad Yadav, BSP chief Mayawati and Trinamool Congress' Rajya Sabha chief Derek O'Brien and requested them to join an informal meeting with Jaitley.