Assembly adjourned till Monday

Hyderabad, June 14: The State Legislative Assembly was adjourned for the day till Monday without carrying out any business for the fourth consecutive day on Friday.

Earlier, the House was adjourned twice for half-an-hour following protest by the opposition parties over the Telangana issue. The TRS, BJP and CPI members strongly protested against the denial of permission for Chalo Assembly rally and demanded that the House adopts a Telangana resolution. The TDP MLAs too joined the protest.

As soon as the House met at 9 AM, the TRS MLAs rushed to the podium of Speaker Nadendla Manohar raising “Jai Telangana” slogans. They were joined by the BJP and CPI legislators, who also wanted Telangana resolution in the House. The TDP members too joined the protest by rushing towards the Speaker’s podium. The opposition members raised slogans against the indiscriminate arrests by the police to foil the Chalo Assembly. Following uproar in the House, the Speaker adjourned the House for half-an-hour.

When the House re-assembled at about 10.04 AM, the TRS, TDP, BJP and CPI members again rushed to the Speaker’s podium and started raising slogans against the government over the Telangana issue. The Speaker tried in vain to convince the agitating members. However, the opposition members continued the slogan shouting.

Meanwhile, the Speaker announced that all questions listed for Question Hour as deemed to have been answered and all papers deemed to have been laid on the table. With no signs of normalcy returning to the House, the Speaker again adjourned the House for half-an-hour at about 10.06 AM.

The House met again at about 10.37 AM. While the opposition members continued their protest, the Speaker directed Finance Minister Anam Ramnarayana Reddy to introduce the AP Public Safety (Measures) Enforcement Bill and AP Value Added Tax (Second Amendment) Bill. However, Nagarkurnool MLA Nagam Janardhan Reddy prevented the minister from reading out the Bill. Meanwhile, the TRS MLAs too surrounded the minister which forced the Speaker to adjourn the House for the day till Monday.

With two adjournments for half-an-hour each, the Assembly functioned for about six minutes on Friday.

Interestingly, Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy, whose early arrival to the Assembly turned controversial, did not attend the House on Friday. Similarly, Leader of the Opposition N Chandrababu Naidu was not present as he had left for the USA on Thursday.

This is the fourth consecutive day when the Assembly failed to function over Telangana issue. On the first day of the second-leg of budget session of Assembly on June 10, the House carried the condolence motion over the demise of MLA Ambati Brahmanaiah. From the second day onwards, its proceedings remained paralysed.

- INN