BJP distances itself from Subramanian Swamy's GST remarks

Already facing an upheaval task of getting the Goods and Services Tax (GST) bill passed in Parliament due to continuous uproar by the Opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party has distanced itself from party leader Subramanian Swamy's statement on the bill.

Swamy had said that the GST bill is not that important that he should sacrifice his fight for corruption for the same. "The bill is not worth the price that I should leave fighting corruption for it. The bill should be sacrificed for the cause of fighting corruption," he had said.

Swamy had added that the government does not need the bill and the required changes can be brought even without a bill being passed. "They don't need any parliamentary amendment. Reduce the excise tax to 21 commodities," he suggested.

He also dismissed the efforts of the government to reach out to the opposition to get the bill passed. "It is the government's problem how they want to run Parliament. I'm not worried that. I will continue to fight corruption," he said.

Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Vice President Rahul Gandhi is facing summons from a Delhi court over allegations of misappropriation of funds in the multi-crore National Herald case. Calling Congressmen jokers, Swamy, who is the petitioner in the case, alleged that the party is misleading the public.

While the Congress has been claiming that the court summons issued to its leaders are a personal vendetta of the BJP, Swamy said that such statements are against the judiciary. "It is contempt of court that they think that the judiciary is being run by the BJP," he claimed.