Friday, February 25 2005 20:31 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: Describing as "colourless, tasteless and odourless" the President's address to Parliament, the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) today (Feb 25, 2005) said it gave no "direction" and spoke only of committees, commissions and anniversary celebrations.

"It is colourless, tasteless and odourless. Except for engineering downfall of Governments, removing Governors and officers and changing textbooks, this Government has done nothing in the past nine months. The Government which swears by the common man has betrayed him the most", BJP Parliamentary Party spokesman V K Malhotra told reporters in New Delhi.

Alleging that unemployment was on the rise and no new employment was being generated, he said, "The Address gives no direction. It only talks about celebrating the anniversaries of Dandi Yatra, Munshi Premchandra, India Post, Albert Einstein's theory, the centenary of the upheaval against partition of Bengal in 1905 besides setting up of commissions, committees and issuing White Paper".

"They have no right to celebrate the Bengal event as the State was partitioned 42 years later," he said.

Referring to the yesterday's attack on the Divisional Commissioner's complex in Srinagar and arrest of a person with fake Indian currency while coming out of the Pakistan High Commission, he said, "By allowing travel on the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad bus route without passports, the Government is playing with the nation's security. Terrorists who used to cross high mountains can now come by bus."