New Delhi, July 15: The clamour of me-first in BJP for opening debates on various issues in Parliament has been resolved with Jaswant Singh agreeing to speak on the Finance Bill and Yashwant Sinha volunteering to open the debate on UPA government’s performance in the G-8 and NAM summit.
“I called up Jaswant Singh when he was on a visit to his village in Rajasthan recently and asked him to initiate the debate on the Finance Bill. He said he was honoured and gave his consent,” Deputy Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha, Sushma Swaraj told reporters here today.
Earlier, BJP had asked Sinha to open the debate on the Finance Bill. But Sinha has now decided to speak on the performance of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his government during the recently concluded G-8 summit in Italy and the on-going NAM summit.
Sinha was reportedly miffed when the party denied him the opportunity to initiate the debate on the general budget as Murli Manohar Joshi, who is senior to him, expressed his wish to do so.
BJP has faced a war of egos between several senior leaders during this Budget session over the issue of initiating debates in both the Houses of Parliament.
During the Railway Budget debate, Shahnawaz Hussain showed his displeasure by tabling his speech in the Lok Sabha as Ananth Kumar was given the opportunity to initiate the debate.
—-Agencies