Mumbai: Legislative Assembly speaker Haribhau Bagade has suspended 10 Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and Nine Congress MLAs over the ruckus created by them in the House on Saturday.
The punishment came as a shock for the Opposition, which later boycotted the entire proceedings. “The BJP with its dictatorial tendencies is trying to suppress the voice of farmers in the state,” charged an Opposition leader.
On Wednesday morning, when the Assembly met for special sitting after four days’ leave, only six Opposition and two Shiv Sena members were present in the House. However, almost every Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA was present. Parliamentary affairs minister Girish Bapat then rose to propose a resolution of suspension. After naming all 19 MLAs he said, “The budget was symbol of the dreams of 12,00,00,000 Marathi citizens. But Opposition members burnt copies of it. This is unconstitutional and action must be taken against them.”
Mr Bagade then approved the suspension resolution with a voice vote, after which Opposition leader Radhakrishna Vikhe-Patil condemned the decision on the floor of the House. He said, “Demanding a loan waiver for farmers was not unethical demand. Our slogans were for the farmers. But if the government is not ready to listen and wants us to keep mum on issues, we will hit the streets.” After these remarks were made, the Opposition boycotted the House proceedings.
Finance minister Sudhir Mungantiwar later demanded that Mr Vikhe Patil’s words be expunged.
Opposition party leaders including its top brass was in dark about the decision to suspend 19 MLAs on Wednesday morning. It displayed lack of coordination between the opposition parties and the Bharatiya Janta Party’s (BJP). The opposition MLAs also met Governor Rao.
