Protests, Slogan-shouting Mark Assembly Opening
Patna: July 24, 2008
|
Protests, Slogan-shouting Mark Assembly Opening
|
|
Photo by Anupam Singh |
|
|
Insanity returned to Bihar Assembly with the opening of the monsoon session on Thursday as the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) leaders, supported by other parties in the Opposition declaring their only intention was to disrupt the proceedings whether anything was accomplished or not.
As before, the Opposition came to the Assembly armed with freshly-designed placards and banners sporting catchy, rhyming two-liners 'to expose the NDA government that has failed on all fronts', as the RJD spokesperson Shyam Rajak put it.
Hoping to ambush the government on the issue of water-logging in Patna, a belligerent Opposition chanted slogans inside the state Legislature and when asked by the Chairperson Prof. Arun Kumar to keep the noise low, the RJD and Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) leaders became even more louder making it impossible for any meaningful discussion to take place.
Inside the Assembly, the opposition leaders were not exactly singing Kumbaya with their NDA counterparts as Rajak, Ramchandra Purbey, Shakeel Ahmed Khan, Mundrika Singh Yadav and others disrupted the address of House Speaker Uday Narayan Chowdhary accusing the government of failing to check water-logging in Patna while blaming it for lack of any development in the state.
Chandan Bagchi of Congress went so far as to say that the ruling NDA was trying to evade tough questions on its performance by the opposition leaders and therefore opted for a short, 8-day long monsoon session.
"This session should be longer if anything positive has to come out of it," Bagchi said ignoring the fact that the opposition had already announced its decision that its goal was to continue to disrupt the Assembly and a meaningful dialog with the government was nowhere in its agenda.
Former Chief Minister and the leader of the Opposition Rabri Devi could not attend the opening day of the monsoon session by choosing to remain in New Delhi.
|
|
