NEW DELHI, India: The Bharatya Janata Party (BJP) in a memorandum to the Indian President, Giani Zail Singh, has mocked the ruling Congress (1) for attributing the present uproar in India over the series of scandals which have lately surfaced to conspiracy.

“In this conspiracy, according to them, not only parties and the Indian Press and former Finance and Defense Minister Shri V.P. Singh, but you too, Mr. President are supposed to become conspirators”, the memorandum noted.

The memorandum urged the President to give his “same counsel” to the Prime Minister, Mr. Rajiv Gandhi, to step down from office and seek a fresh mandate.

The Prime Minister, the memorandum said, had forfeited the mandate of the people in the wake of feeling extremely agitated over the scandals of the Fairfax affair, the German submarine deal and the Swedish gun contract.

The presentation of the memorandum marked the conclusion of the weeklong “Rajiv must resign campaign”.

“I wish I had the information to refute what you say and thus defend my government”, President Giani Zail Singh reportedly told the BJP delegation while accepting the memorandum.

The memorandum said: “The Prime Minister’s refusal to share information about the Bofors deal even with you, Mr. President, strengthens the suspicion that the Government has much to hide. It is a matter apart that in doing so the Prime Minister is guilty of violating Article 78 of the Constitution, which casts a duty on him to furnish to the President information relating to the administration of the affairs of the Union as the President may call for and not as the Cabinet may wish”.

Giani Zail Singh, according to the BJP sources, met the delegation with his customary bonhomie towards guests drawing them in an embrace. Nor did he omit to recite couplets for which he is so well known.

The one chosen for the occasion was. Ai hai yeh majboorian, pass rehka bhi doorian (Oh, these ironies of life, that such distances should come between us when we are also close). The BJP President Mr. L.K.

Advani, told newsmen after submitting the memorandum that while the crucial issue in the public debate on the President Prime Minister’s relations was the President’s right of information governed by Article 78 of the Indian Constitution the government had deliberately tried to raise a debate on the President’s right of dismissal of the government.

The Prime Minister’s stand in the matter was not only constitutionally unsound but politically self-incriminating as it strengthen May 29 1987World Sikh News Page 7 end the suspicion that he was not providing details to the President as he had something to hide, Mr. Advani said.

Article extracted from this publication >>  May 29, 1987