Taking the United Progressive Alliance government to task for its "masterly inactivity" on black money front, senior BJP leader L K Advani on Friday demanded a white paper on the issue of making public names of Indian account holders in Swiss banks.
"I demand that names of account holders in Swiss banks which have been given by the French government to India recently, must be made public and prompt follow up action be taken against them," Advani who arrived in Pune on his Jan Chetna Yatra told a press conference.
Hinting that the focus of upcoming winter session will be on black money, Advani said "UPA government has demonstrated masterly inactivity and there is a deliberate design to divert and sidetrack the issue itself. Why the names of the account holders not being released?"
Alleging that the very intention of government is "suspect", he said the taxation agreement with Switzerland would become effective from April 2012 and could enable the defaulters to transfer their account to some other banks or withdraw their money from Swiss bank.
Continuing his attack on Congress led UPA, Advani said it appeared that only the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam was suffering for corruption charges.
"The Congress is running the UPA government. Only the DMK is suffering for corruption. I have no soft corner for DMK, but the names of other persons who have endorsed it have also surfaced in 2-G spectrum scam," he commented.
On Jan Lokpal Bill
Advani said he was hopeful of its passing in the winter session of Parliament and added that Team Anna had met BJP leaders during their discussions of Jan Lokpal draft and agreed to remove some discrepancies in it as suggested by the party.
There should not be any problem in passing the Bill if both Congress and BJP were in agreement, he noted.
Advani reiterated the party stand that Prime Minister should be included in the purview of Lokpal bill.
He said just as good governance and corruption cannot co-exist, democracy and dynastic succession cannot go together and added that it was "shocking" that the principal political party in the country had accepted dynastic rule in principle.
Asked if the Lokpal Bill will help curb corruption in the country, Advani said, "I do not believe that corruption in the country is because of inadequacy of laws. I do not subscribe to this view basically."
Advani said even though Anna Hazare's Jan Lokpal Bill had four basic shortcomings, he had asked even his party colleagues not to point out these shortcomings publicly, because Hazare's campaign was against corruption.
He said when Anna's team had come to meet us to discuss the issue, four basic flaws in the Jan Lokpal Bill had been told to them, to which they agreed.
He, however, stressed that the Prime Minister should come under the Lokpal.
On dynastic politics
Without naming the Gandhi family, Advani said, "The premier party has accepted dynastic succession as a principle. Is it not shocking...the world over we are criticised for this, but not within the country.
"Therefore, my party has categorically said that just as good governance and corruption cannot go together, similarly democracy and dynastic succession cannot co-exist," he said, adding he was saying this for all parties.
Speaking further on the issue, he said, "While in case of other shortcomings the media is forthright, there is something about this which we cannot talk about, we cannot write about".
