Assembly Deadlock Continues; Nitish Softens
Patna: Mar. 14, 2007
The impasse over who should apologize first in the state Assembly – the ruling party for passing censure motion against the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leaders, or the Opposition leaders for vandalizing the Assembly property – continued on Wednesday though the NDA government, according to some sources, is beginning to show some sign of caving in.
Assembly Speaker Uday Narayan Chowdhary, taking a rather softer stand, on Wednesday, appealed to the Opposition leaders to put an end to their three-day boycott of the House and come to the table to negotiate, a suggestion quickly shot down by the RJD leaders saying there was no question of withdrawal until the censure motion against them was struck down in totality.
"First, the ruling government must withdraw the motion against us; only then we will come to the negotiation table and depending on the nature of the talk, we will then decide whether we should withdraw our boycott of the Assembly or not,” RJD leader Ramchandra Purbe said.
Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said sometimes things do get ugly in the Assembly but one should not make it a prestige issue. "Besides, the motion for censure was only for the RJD leaders who, by their shameful behavior on Monday, degraded the honor of the House,” Kumar said adding he was willing to talk to the opposition leaders and put an end to the 3-day impasse in an amicable manner.
Rabri Devi, the leader of the Opposition, flat out refused to budge from her stand. "The boycott is here to stay until the censure motion against us is unconditionally withdrawn," she said.
"The Nitish government is trying to suppress the voice of the Opposition and we will make sure it does not succeed in its nefarious design," the former Chief Minister of Bihar said.
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