NEW DELHI: Hitting back, Congress today alleged that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's "insincerity" and "obduracy" were responsible for Parliament logjam and demanded that BJP apologise for "damaging" India's growth story by opposing progressive legislations during UPA rule.
The opposition party was reacting after Modi accused Congress of "misusing" Parliament to stop the country's growth as several important bill remained pending due to disruption of proceeding in the two Houses.
"It is BJP and Prime Minister Modi who are responsible for the logjam in Parliament," Congress spokesperson Anand Sharma said and alleged that Opposition has not been engaged in any meaningful dialogue to end the impasse.
"PM speaks on everything but he has not engaged opposition in meaningful dialogue to break logjam. PM is neither sincere nor serious regarding the Parliament functioning.
"It is his (PM) obduracy that is responsible for logjam. We want Parliament to function. We have appealed to the government that you cannot rewrite the rule book," he said outside Parliament.
Taking on Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, Sharma said, "Jaitley is blaming opposition. It is unfair. Opposition has raised certain acts of omission and commission."
On GST issue, Sharma accused the government of disrespecting the rules. "It involves amendment in the Constitution. There are rules and procedures and the House decides which subjects are to be take up in the House. The Business Advisory Committee decides on it.
"There has not been any discussion on the Constitutional amendment bill in the Business Advisory Committee. Nor has it allocated any time. It is violation of rules. There was neither any agreement nor discussion on it. Government needs to explain why there is no transparency on this issue."
Claiming to be "author of GST", he said, "It was the BJP which opposed the GST and leading the charge was the then Gujarat Chief Minister Modi. Jaitley and Sushma Swaraj also opposed it. Every new initiatives, policy changes proposals of the UPA government were opposed by them".
"It was consistently opposed by them. Insurance Bill, Mining Bill, Indo-US nuclear agreement, FDI in multibrand retail and civil aviation sector, the list is long one," he said.
Slamming BJP for blocking these "progressive" measures, Sharma said, "I would advise Jatley and BJP Ministers to reflect, introspect and apologise for the damage they did when they opposed India's growth story."
He said Congress is a mature and responsible party. "Unlike them we have shown maturity and that's why Insurance Bill, Mining Bill, Land boundary bills were passed."
Congress has been demanding resignation of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje on Lalit Modi controversy and that of Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan over the Vyapam scam.