A thing of discord among its rivals is a joy forever for the ruling Congress. The party continues to sit comfortably on the fence, as both the Aam Aadmi Party and the Akalis continue to slug it out after turning Vidhan Sabha into a political arena in a battle for one-upmanship before the parliamentary polls.
Delighted it stands, as the entire opposition — be it its arch rivals SAD-BJP or the main opposition AAP, or be it the trifling Lok Insaaf Party (LIP) — was attacking each other, questioning each other and even trying to put each other down. And all the Congress MLAs did, is smiling at the sight.
All the rival parties were listing out numerous issue to corner the ruling regime, but they ended up fighting among themselves.
Akalis accused AAP of “conniving” with the Congress to save their “chair” of the Leader of Opposition. On the other hand, AAP blamed the Akalis of shedding the crocodile tears by staging walkout on ill-treatment meted out to the protesting teachers.
LIP MLA Simarjeet Bains take on both SAD and AAP for being hand-in-glove to disallow state government’s buses to enter the IGI Airport in New Delhi, while facilitating Badals’ private buses by conspiring with the AAP-led Delhi Government.
“Nothing could be best for the ruling party. They are actually fighting among themselves as they have no issue to raise, they have nothing against the government to say. It is they who are harming the state’s interest, they proved it themselves,” a Cabinet Minister told The Pioneer “off the record”.
During the question hour, when the Akalis staged a walk out after the Speaker Rana KP Singh rejected their adjournment motion on the harassment of protesting teachers at Patiala, Simarjeet Bains reminded how the SAD leader and former Education Minister “himself used to beat and pull female teachers from hair” while requesting the Government to look into the teachers’ genuine demands.
Later when the Speaker Rana KP Singh tabled the report of business advisory committee, SAD MLA Parminder Singh Dhindsa accused AAP of being hand-in-glove with the ruling party as “they are not raising any objection to the shirt duration of the session”.
During the debate on the Governor’s Address, the House witnessed a fiery exchange of words between the SAD and AAP leaders. But the exact reason or the statement that triggered the same was unknown.
SAD MLA NK Sharma made some statement that irked the AAP MLAs, and the two sides, with AAP led by Aman Arora and SAD’s Dhindsa, Sharma, Gurpartap Singh Wadala, Pawan Kumar Tinu, engaged in verbal duel. Later, Speaker expunged the remarks.
Aman Aora, afterwards, apologised from the House for “losing my cool”.
In fact while attacking the Congress Government on the issue of law and order, the AAP MLAs made a veiled attack on the erstwhile SAD-BJP regime. “Please don’t do what they did in 10 years...don’t follow their footsteps,” urged AAP MLA Kultar Singh Sandhwan.
When Aman Arora was defending allegations against the AAP-led Delhi Government of disallowing state’s buses and allowing private operators to ply and pick passengers from Delhi Airport, Simarjeet Bains questioned why the state government’s buses were stopped “after Majithia-Kejriwal deal” while referring to AAP supremo Kejriwal’s apology to SAD MLA and former Minister Bikram Majithia for drug allegations.
Bains’ statement fumed AAP legislators so much that even after the House was adjourned for the day, they continued to argue. And the Cabinet Minister Aruna Chaudhary and Congress MLA Barindermeet Singh Pahra were all smiles, must be thanking their luck to have a divided opposition.
