PM must speak on S-band allocation, says BJP

The Bharatiya Janata Party demanded a statement from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the S-band allocation controversy, saying the subject falls under a department which is looked after by him and it involved the country's security. ''Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will meet editors of television channels on Wednesday and we want him to speak on the S-band allocation issue. He has not spoken on this,'' BJP National spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman told reporters in Kolkata. ''The department is held by the prime minister. This is a new scam termed as S-band scam. This is a very serious issue. We want a statement by the PM,'' she said.

She said that the bandwidth which had been given to a private party was used by the Coast Guard and other national security agencies. She was speaking after the meeting of the party's national office-bearers. The BJP spokesperson said, ''We also want the prime minister to speak on the whole issue of corruption and blackmoney. Why are we not signing the UN charter of corruption? It would have been easier to get information,'' she said.

The BJP spokesperson said that the prime minister should also speak on price rise and food inflation. Saying that an economist was leading the country, she said, "We have had two full years of inflation. The prime minister should speak on this issue.''

Turning to the demand of setting up a JPC, Sitharaman said ''We are demanding JPC not only specifically on the 2G spectrum scam, but on the whole issue of corruption.'' Apart from Nirmala Sitharaman, Arun Jaitley and a host of senior BJP leaders including L K Advani, party president Nitin Gadkari and former party chief Rajnath Singh are attending a crucial meeting of the party's office-bearers in view of the upcoming assembly polls in five states.

The meeting will take stock of the situation in the five states going to the polls, the party's preparedness and prospects of alliance with other parties, BJP central observer Chandan Mitra had said.