INDIA bloc to protest in Parliament over ‘discrimination’ against Opposition-ruled states in budget

New Delhi, July 23

INDIA bloc parties on Tuesday decided that they would protest in Parliament and outside over “discrimination” against the opposition-ruled states in the Union Budget.

The decision was taken at a meeting of floor leaders of INDIA bloc parties at the 10 Rajaji Marg residence of Congress president and Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge in the evening.

Kharge, Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, Congress’ deputy leader in Rajya Sabha Pramod Tiwari, Congress’ deputy leader in Lok Sabha Gaurav Gogoi, NCP (SCP) chief Sharad Pawar, Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut, TMC leaders Derek O’Brien and Kalyan Banerjee, DMK’s TR Baalu, JMM’s Mahua Maji, AAP’s Raghav Chadha and Sanjay Singh, and CPI(M)’s John Brittas, among others, attended the meeting.

Congress general secretaries KC Venugopal and Jairam Ramesh were also present in the meeting.

“The concept of a budget has already been destroyed by this year’s Union Budget. They have completely discriminated against most of the states. So general sentiment of the INDIA bloc meeting was: we have to protest against this,” Venugopal told reporters after the meeting.

Later, in a post on X, Venugopal said, “The Union Budget presented today was extremely discriminatory and dangerous, which completely goes against the principles of federalism and fairness that the Union Government must follow.”

In protest, Congress chief ministers will be boycotting the NITI Aayog meeting scheduled for July 27.

“This government’s attitude is completely antithetical to Constitutional principles. We will not participate in an event that is solely designed to hide the true, discriminatory colours of this regime,” he said.

Congress MP Pramod Tiwari alleged that the budget had “blacked out” states where there are non-BJP governments.

“We will hold a protest tomorrow in Parliament. We will raise our voice inside Parliament and outside also…This is not the budget of the BJP, it is the budget of the whole country, but they have presented it as if it is BJP’s budget…This budget is against the federal structure of the country,” he alleged.