Has law minister Ashwani Kumar, and to a lesser extent prime minister Manmohan Singh, lost confidence of Congress MPs and even ministers? Going by the overall lack of discomfiture among many ministers and MPs, and their apparent disinterest in coming to the rescue as the opposition tore into the government over the coal blocks allocation scam in parliament on Monday, that may not be a wrong inference to deduce.

While the ‘Coalgate’ scam, as expected, brought both houses of parliament to a halt on the opening day of the second part of budget session, the AIADMK scored the maximum points in Rajya Sabha as the party’s MPs came out the most vociferous in cornering UPA ministers. Getting the question hour suspended in Rajya Sabha, the party’s MPs brought the coal blocks allocation scam into focus.

Six union ministers present in the upper house did not come to the rescue of Kamal Nath, the parliamentary affairs minister who was fighting a lone battle.
On the other hand, despite all talks about alliances ahead of 2014 general elections and the main opposition wooing all possible parties, the BJP’s MPs did not extend support to AIADMK MPs when the latter raised the coal scam.  As AIADMK’s V Maitreyan rose and shouted that the law minister be brought to the bar of the house, no BJP MP stood up to support Maitreyan.

After a careful reading of the opening day of parliament, the impression emerges that the UPA is crumbling, and that neither many ministers nor Congress MPs have much interest in saving prime minister Singh or law minister Ashwani Kumar, who allegedly vetted the CBI’s report on coal block allocation scam.

Far from rising to support their fellow cornered minister, the six union ministers present in Rajya Sabha were seen enjoying the predicament of Kamal Nath, while leader of opposition in the upper house, Arun Jaitley stood up to corner Rajiv Sukhla on CAG. Farooq Abdullah, Jairam Ramesh and Rehman Khan seemed more immersed in the heat of the discussion than standing up to save the government with counter-arguments.

As is evident from the proceedings in both houses despite PM Manmohan Singh’s appeal for smooth functioning of parliament, the Coalgate scam involving the PM and Ashwani Kumar is likely to dominate the houses for the next two or three days at least.