Telangana Assembly turns into battlefield

Hyderabad, March 7 (INN): The floor of the Telangana State Legislative Assembly resembled like a war zone on Saturday with members of ruling and opposition parties throwing abuses and even blows at each other. While the opposition parties tried to disrupt the address by Governor ESL Narasimhan to the Telangana Legislature on the first day of budget session, the TRS members foiled the attempt by using physical strength.

It was a no holds barred situation for all. As soon as the Governor arrived in the House at about 10.56 AM, the opposition members started shouting slogans of ‘shame-shame’ while accusing him of remaining mute on defections of opposition MLAs to the ruling party in violation of Anti-Defection Law. They were particularly critical of the Governor administering oath to TDP MLA Talasani Srinivas Yadav as the State Cabinet minister without acceptance of his resignation.

The Governor was received by Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao, Council Chairman Swamy Goud, Assembly Speaker S Madhusudan Chary, Legislative Affairs Minister T Harish Rao and Legislature Secretary Dr S Raja Sadaram. But the opposition members resorted to intense slogan shouting even before they were seated. Some opposition members continued slogan shouting without even realising that the National Anthem was being played in the House. While the Governor himself signalled the opposition members to remain silent in respect of National Anthem, Leader of the Opposition K Jana Reddy had to intervene to silence his party legislators.

The slogan shouting resumed when the Governor started his address in the House. The TDP legislators, led by Errabelli Dayakar Rao, rushed to the podium. They were followed by the Congress MLAs and MLCs. But before they could go close to the Governor, marshalls rushed in and formed a human chain to prevent them from coming closer to the podium. Meanwhile, the TRS MLAs too rushed near the podium. While one group of TRS legislators formed a human chain around podium, another indulged in exchange of abuses with the opposition members.

Later, the Legislative Affairs Minister and Deputy CM Kadiam Srihari called back the TRS members to their seats. The Chief Minister remained silent throughout the speech and did not even look at the protesting legislators. He kept his eyes focused only on the speech copy.

The situation turned tense with members of both treasury and opposition benches hurling abuses and blows at each other. Some members tore the copies of Governor’s address and threw missiles on Narasimhan.

Interestingly, the happenings in the House did not deter the Governor from delivering his address. Amid continuous slogan shouting and chaos, he read out 16 pages of his speech in about 17 minutes. He began and concluded his speech in Telugu while he read out the remaining portion in English.

The House turned silent at the end of Governor’s speech at about 11.14 AM. All members stood in silence for the National Anthem. However, the TDP members shouted ‘Governor Down Down’ slogans when Narsimhan was leaving the House.