Avtar Bhat
JAMMU, Mar 19: With BJP today deciding to boycott the State Assembly till the suspension of its State president and MLA Nagrota, Jugal Kishore Sharma is revoked by the Speaker Mubarak Gul, the entire Opposition benches barring few were empty during the second sitting today as PDP the main Opposition party has already boycotted the Assembly for the rest of the session last week.
The BJP Legislative party Leader, Ashok Khajuria told reporters here soon after the suspension and marshalling out of Mr Sharma from the House that all the four party MLAs will boycott the rest of the session till the suspension order of his party colleague is revoked by the Speaker.
Though Opposition is the soul of Parliamentary democracy and its role is termed more important than that of treasury benches but it was a one sided affair in the Assembly during the second sitting today.
The lone JSM, MLA Ashwani Kumar Sharma who too had staged a walkout in support of BJP MLAs did not attend the House during the second sitting later. The two NPP members, Balwant Singh Mankotia and Yashpaul Kundal were also conspicuous by their absence.
However, the NPP leader and MLA Ramnagar, Harshdev Singh was present in the House and he also left after speaking on the annual grants of Ministry of Revenue, Relief and Rehabilitation.
Barring four members of rebel BJP including Jagdish Raj Sapolia, Prof Garu Ram, Bharat Bushan and Master Lal Chand and CPI (M) lone member Mohammed Yousaf Tarigami no member from Opposition was present in the House while Minister of Revenue, Relief and Rehabilitation, Aijaz Ahmed Khan was replying to annual grants of his Ministry.
Even among the four BJP breakaway group members no one was ready to counter Engineer Rashid who while speaking on annual grants of Revenue Ministry said that people from erstwhile Doda district migrated due to atrocities committed on them by Village Defence Committee (VDC) members. And in Kashmir valley a large number of people were internally displaced due to Army atrocities.
In case the BJP too sticks to its decision to boycott the House for rest of the session as announced by it, the House will be deprived of the main Opposition during the rest of the Budget Session.
BJP which made it clear that it will not attend the House for remaining session till the suspension order is revoked, said that Jugal Kishore Sharma was protesting within his Constitutional Rights in the House.
“As a member I enjoy privilege to protest and raise the important issues of public importance or concerning the unity and integrity of the nation”, Jugal Kishore later told reporters at party headquarters along with his other three party colleagues.
Denying that he misbehaved with Minister of Social Welfare Sakina, Itoo in the House during protest, Sharma said that he most respects fair sex and there was no question of misbehavior with Ms Itoo.
He alleged that he was dragged from the House by Ministers and marshal and termed the act totally undemocratic and unfortunate.
Jugal said that he is ready to face any action including termination of his membership than tolerate anti national utterances.
“It is unfortunate that most of the time in the current session of State Legislative Assembly has been spent on the issue of Afzal Guru and the Coalition Government has allowed members to waste time without realizing that there are more important pressing issues facing the people of the three regions of the State”, Sharma said.
BJP cannot afford to allow anti-national and pro-secessionists to hijack valuable time of the House, where people have sent their representatives to form policies and redress the grievances pertaining various sections of the people, he said and alleged that the ruling alliance of NC and Congress were hand in glow to rake-up the sentiments of the people for their vote bank politics.
Referring about today’s development in the House, BJP leader said that the party MLAs wanted to raise the issues pertaining to discrimination with Jammu province on developmental front. As there was no satisfactory reply coming from the treasury bench, the party was forced to protest in the House as the Speaker allowed one of the MLAs to continue raising the issue of Afzal Guru, Sharma said.
The BJP President, denied that he had used any derogatory words against NC women Minister during the protest. “Rather she used some words which were unparliamentary”, he said and added that many NC and Congress Ministers and MLAs forced me out of the House.
The party holds women in high esteem and this is the reason that the BJP has given about 33 percent representation to women in various committees and fora of the party.
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