Congress candidate from Amritsar Amarinder Singh today hit back at BJP nominee Arun Jaitley, saying the latter should check records of his own performance in Parliament before questioning others.
Singh claimed "the whole country is angry and ashamed of" the way the opposition under Jaitley's leadership "sabotaged and undermined the democratic functioning" in Parliament.
After inaugurating the Amritsar District Congress (rural) office here, Singh was responding to Jaitley's charges about his low attendance when he was a members of Punjab Assembly.
He asked Jaitley to tell the people of the country in general and Amritsar and Punjab in particular whether he availed the perks and other benefits as an MP even after the disruption of the House.
"Crores and crores of rupees were wasted as they held Parliament to ransom," the former Chief Minister said.
About his own attendance in the Assembly, Singh said he might not have attended all sittings, but whenever he attended he found the behaviour of the treasury benches disgusting.
On Jaitely's charges that Singh was avoiding national issues, the former Chief Minister said, "It is just a beginning... The battle begins from Amritsar."
"Actually Jaitley still appears to be under Rajya Sabha hangover where he is not accountable to anyone so here he does not appear to bother about the people from whom he is seeking votes," he said.
"He is welcome to a debate on any issue of his choice which he may feel to be national," Singh said, adding "for me the issues concerning the common man of Punjab are as important as those Jaitley thinks are national, even if someone like him (Jaitley) finds them less interesting".
Meanwhile at public meeting at Attari, Singh said that the Akali-BJP alliance was most opportunistic.
He pointed out, while the two parties were fighting the election together in Punjab, in the immediate neighbourhood of Haryana they were fighting against each other. He also lashed out at Punjab minister Vikram Singh Majithia for allegedly criminalising politics in Amritsar.
