'Sonia Gandhi's math is weak': BJP taunts on eve of no-trust vote
NEW DELHI: With numbers not looking anywhere close to stacking up on the Opposition side, the ruling BJP has mocked Congress chief Sonia Gandhi's suggestion that she may have the numbers.
"Sonia ji's math is weak. They had calculated similarly in 1996. We know what happened then," ANI quoted Parliamentary Affairs minister Ananth Kumar as saying on Thursday.
This comes a day after the UPA chairperson contested questions on how the Opposition would rustle up numbers during Friday's anti-trust motion against the Narendra Modi government which has a comfortable majority in the Lok Sabha.
"Who says we don't have the numbers?"she had shot back when NDTV put across the question.
Kumar's reference was to Gandhi's ill-fated claim in 1999 when the onus was on the Congress to produce numbers after Atal Bihari Vajpayee's government fell in the Lok Sabha by one vote.
"We have 272, with more coming in," she famously said outside the Rashtrapati Bhavan then after staking claim with the president.
Embarrassingly for the Congress the majority mark never came, Vajpayee went ahead with the caretaker government and the BJP and allies came back to power later that year with a cosy majority.
Friday's no-confidence motion is moved by Chandrababu Naidu's Telugu Desam which was within the NDA till recently, but parted ways over Andhra not getting a special status.
At the current strength of the House, the NDA needs 268 votes. It's current strength is 314 - minus the Speaker - which also includes nagging ally Shiv Sena. The BJP alone has 273.
Among the remaining are non-aligned regional allies like AIADMK(37) and BJD (20) who are expected to abstain from the voting.
Minister Kumar told reporters:"Their calculation is wrong again. Modi government has a majority inside and outside Parliament."
"Sonia ji's math is weak. They had calculated similarly in 1996. We know what happened then," ANI quoted Parliamentary Affairs minister Ananth Kumar as saying on Thursday.
This comes a day after the UPA chairperson contested questions on how the Opposition would rustle up numbers during Friday's anti-trust motion against the Narendra Modi government which has a comfortable majority in the Lok Sabha.
"Who says we don't have the numbers?"she had shot back when NDTV put across the question.
Kumar's reference was to Gandhi's ill-fated claim in 1999 when the onus was on the Congress to produce numbers after Atal Bihari Vajpayee's government fell in the Lok Sabha by one vote.
"We have 272, with more coming in," she famously said outside the Rashtrapati Bhavan then after staking claim with the president.
Embarrassingly for the Congress the majority mark never came, Vajpayee went ahead with the caretaker government and the BJP and allies came back to power later that year with a cosy majority.
Friday's no-confidence motion is moved by Chandrababu Naidu's Telugu Desam which was within the NDA till recently, but parted ways over Andhra not getting a special status.
At the current strength of the House, the NDA needs 268 votes. It's current strength is 314 - minus the Speaker - which also includes nagging ally Shiv Sena. The BJP alone has 273.
Among the remaining are non-aligned regional allies like AIADMK(37) and BJD (20) who are expected to abstain from the voting.
Minister Kumar told reporters:"Their calculation is wrong again. Modi government has a majority inside and outside Parliament."