'Joshi used PAC chair to revive political career'

The government on Thursday unleashed an attack on Murli Manohar Joshi questioning his credibility, saying he was using the chairmanship of the Public Accounts Committee as a comeback vehicle to revive his "sagging" political fortunes.

"Murli Manohar Joshi has been making a desperate attempt to use the PAC chairmanship as a comeback vehicle to revive his sagging political fortunes. After the rout of the Bharatiya Janata Party under its senior leadership, it is witnessing an intra-party succession war amongst leaders much younger to Dr Joshi.

"He now hopes that perhaps the PAC chairmanship will help him generate enough ammunition to be once again in the reckoning in the BJP," Parliamentary Affairs minister Pawan Kumar Bansal said at a press conference.

Bansal was referring to the recent remarks by Joshi in which he had slammed the United Progressive Alliance for "converting the PAC into a captive committee." He, in turn, said the government could not allow parliamentary committees to be turned in "kangaroo courts."

The previous PAC, among other issues, had considered the 2G spectrum allocation scam and the term of the last committee ended on an acrimonious note when UPA and opposition members remained divided on the draft report on 2G.

UPA claims that Joshi presented the "draft report" to the speaker without it being adopted by the committee. In reply to a question, Bansal said the issue of breach of privilege against Joshi was not before the government.

Asked about the stand of Congress on Joshi, he said he cannot comment on the approach of members of the new PAC. "But the fact remains that by his continuous, malicious

and false propaganda, a question about his credibility, a question on his acceptability, a question on his impartiality does arise," he said.

Asked whether the Lok Sabha speaker has ever 'rejected' a report by a parliamentary committee, especially the PAC, Bansal said the Speaker does not reject a valid report of a committee adopted by it.

"You are presuming the document presented by him is the PAC report. But here is a case where Joshi's report is not adopted. His document at best remains draft report," he said.     

While noting that the government would like to have faith in chairpersons of all parliamentary committees, including Joshi, he said the "mindset" with which Joshi is entering into the second term as PAC Chairman was a "matter of concern".

Bansal, who was flanked by his deputy Ashwani Kumar, charged Joshi with "dragging" the speaker's office in the controversy.

"He continues dragging the office of the speaker also saying the speaker has no other option but to place it on the table of the House. Joshi knows it very well that he has violated the provisions of the rules as the report  was not put to vote, it was not adopted," he added.