Brushing aside speculation that he would be asked to step down, Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil on Monday asserted that he enjoyed "full blessings" of Congress president Sonia Gandhi.
"Well, I have full blessings of my leader," he told CNN-IBN when asked if he enjoyed the confidence of his leader.
Asked if he felt troubled over the fact that he was not called by Sonia at a meeting of senior party leaders in Delhi on Monday morning, Patil said, "Do not put me on defensive. That is not the style in which my leader works, my party works. My party's ethos is to do justice and to see it is done in a manner, which contains and control criminal and terrorists activities and at the same time does give any opportunity to human rights violation."
Patil is under attack over his ministry's handling of internal security and even from some senior Congress leaders over the Delhi blasts.
Refuting charges of intelligence failure, the home minister said in all incidents information was given.
"It was available with us in Delhi also. But what was not available was the timing, the place and the method to be used for the purpose," he said.
Patil said that difficulties arose in the absence of actionable information on the timing and place of the planned attacks.
To a question, he said the Centre had information about the possiblility of terror attack in Delhi even before Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi conveyed it.
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