Note ban logjam might continue during last days of Winter Session

NEW DELHI: As

Parliament

opens on Wednesday after a four day break, with just three work days left for the almost-washed out Winter Session to wind up on December 16, the fifteen

Opposition

parties are preparing to revive their joint attack on the government over demonetisation, to build up the momentum to take the issue out on to the streets, as soon as the session ends.

To make matters worse for the government, reports of corruption charges against minister of state for home affairs Kiren Rijiju that surfaced on Tuesday, has added to the Opposition’s ammunition to sharpen its charge. However, unwilling to allow the focus to move away from the demonetisation issue and the miseries it is causing to common people, the Opposition parties will take a call together at the Wednesday morning meeting to finalise the strategy they will jointly adopt in the House.

The Opposition parties, are also unwilling to accept the government’s proposal to allow finance minister Arun Jaitley be the first speaker in Lok Sabha if a discussion under “no rule” takes place. They feel it is a trap being laid by the government whereby BJP and other NDA party members of the House may not allow any of the other parties to speak after the government has had its say.

While this is the basic thinking in the Opposition camp, the parties are very clear that they will remain together on every step that they take to defeat the government. “We will work on this together, like we have done during the rest of the session and we will jointly decide on the final move at our morning meeting before 10 am tomorrow,” TMC MP Derek O’Brien said, when asked about the issue.

The fifteen Opposition parties, with Congress and Trinamool Congress leading the pack, will also discuss and share amongst themselves the issues related to demonetisation that have directly hit the people, to be taken up when the agitation moves out on to the streets.

For instance, issues like unemployment in various organised and informal sectors, FMCG goods not being sold, the fact that only 1 per cent local grocery shops function on digital payment, 2.5 lakh jute workers get their pay in cash and a similar situation for tea industry workers, the corruption that has come to fore in this context, etc are some of the points that will be brought to the table to be highlighted, sources said.