dibya’s blogosphere

Bangalore (PTI): Congress on Wednesday hit out at BJP Prime Ministerial candidate L.K. Advani for accusing the UPA government of not taking steps to bring back Indian money stashed in Swiss banks and asked him why he had never raised the issue when the NDA was in power.

“Why did Advani who was the Home Minister and also Deputy Prime Minister not raise the issue earlier when he was in office for six years”? Minister of State for External Affairs Anand Sharma said here.

Criticising Mr. Advani for attacking the UPA government about the “ill-gotten money deposited in Swiss banks in 2004″, he sought to know whether no such money had been deposited prior to 2004.

Mr. Advani had claimed he had received an “evasive” reply from the government to his demand for bringing back money stashed in foreign banks, but the government had described the charge as “farther from the truth.”

Flaying Advani’s remarks describing Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as the “weakest” Prime Minister, Mr. Sharma termed it “unfair and uncharitable” and said it was high time he stopped making such statements.

Questioning Mr. Advani about his “very definition of a weak Prime Minister”, Mr. Sharma said “a man who is firm, is a man of integrity and commands respect worldwide is called a weak Prime Minister”.

On BJP Pilibhit candidate Varun Gandhi’s alleged hate speech, Mr. Sharma said: “it is unacceptable in constitutional democracy. Such hate campaigns have no place in India.”

Mr. Sharma said the Congress was contesting about 440 seats in the Lok Sabha polls and expressed optimism that it would win more seats this time than in 2004 when it bagged 145 seats.

He said the Congress had never formed a national alliance but always had “State-specific alliances”, which it already has in eight States, the major being in Maharashtra, J&K, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal.

However, the issue of post-poll alliances would be addressed later “once the arithmetic becomes clear”, he said.

Slamming the Left parties, especially the CPI(M) for “their mindset frozen in decades gone by”, he claimed their ability to influence the voter was “going to diminish sharply in the coming days.”