A Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader has demanded immediate recall of Maharashtra Governor K. Sankaranarayanan, saying he has violated the constitution.
Former BJP president M. Venkaiah Naidu told reporters here Sunday that the Maharashtra governor went out of the way to deny the Central Bureau of Investigation a permission to prosecute former chief minister Ashok Chavan in the Adarsh Housing Society scam.
"The governor has violated principles of constitution. He has no right to be in that post. He should be recalled immediately," he said.
Naidu criticised the Maharashtra cabinet for rejecting the J.A.Patil Judicial Commission report on the Adarsh Housing Society scam in Mumbai and absolving its own ministers. "Then why did you appoint the commission," he asked.
He said the Congress party was trying to whitewash Adarsh scam even after judicial indictment of its four chief ministers.
Referring to Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi's statement that graft is bleeding India, the BJP leader wanted to know who is responsible.
He said it was the same Congress party which tried to cover up the Shunglu Committee report on irregularities in organising the Commonwealth Games in New Delhi.
Naidu said Rahul Gandhi's speech at the FICCI conference reflected the speech of an opposition leader.
"He seems to have forgotten that his party is in power for last 10 years. Earlier it was in power for 50 years. Whatever he is preaching now, his party did not practice."
On Gandhi's remark that without growth, the country can't eliminate poverty, Naidu said the Congress was responsible for bringing down the growth.
"He said they did not hit the six in the recent assembly elections in four states. Forget about hitting the six, they were clean bowled and lost the series," the BJP leader said, using cricket terminology.
Naidu said some cosmetic changes and some face-lifts by making some ministers resign will not help the Congress.
"People are considering Congress as a betrayer, as a non-performer, as insensitive and as an arrogant party, that is why they have rejected it in four assembly elections," he said.
Naidu said people were looking to BJP's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi as the only hope.
Over the communal violence bill, he said, "People will be violent towards the Congress once this bill is introduced in parliament," and added that the BJP is opposed to it tooth and nail.
Asked about Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa aspiring to become the prime minister, Naidu said while everybody has a right to aspire for the post, the experience showed that the leader who wants to lead the nation must belong to the largest party in Parliament.
"Otherwise the experiment will not succeed," he said, and pointed out that V.P. Singh, Chandra Shekhar, Deve Gowda and I.K. Gujral could not complete even a year in the office.
"There can't be two PMs in an alliance. BJP has already decided its prime ministerial candidate," he said when asked about the possibility of an alliance with Jayalalithaa's AIADMK.
Naidu also said that Aam Admi Party owes an explanation to people as it is taking the Congress support to form the government in Delhi after calling it a communal and corrupt party.
The BJP despite being the largest party took a wise decision to not form a government in Delhi, he added.
"We can't take support from Congress. We can't extend support to others as we don't have confidence in others. We thought better to go to people again. Some people thought better to go to the Congress party. We wish them best of luck," Naidu said.
