PUDUCHERRY: Amidst pandemonium in the house, the opposition Congress and DMK members, on Wednesday, staged a walk out in the Territorial Assembly to protest against the ‘unsatisfactory’ replies given by the AINRC government on certain issues.As soon as Speaker V Sabapathy said that members could speak to felicitate deputy speaker TPR Selvam for new appointment, Leader of Opposition V Vaithilingam said certain issues concerning people should be taken up for discussion before greeting the new deputy speaker.Vaithilingam said investigations into the brutal murder near the residence of Chief minister and newly elected member A Tamilselvan a few days ago should be handed over to CBI as the victim and accused both belonged to the same party and added that a resolution in this regard should be adopted in the house. Further he demanded that ‘tainted’ Minister for Education PML Kalyanasundaram be dropped from the ministry. The Speaker replied that as the minister was only facing an accusation, the opposition leader should not term him as ”tainted”.He said the Speaker should also give an explanation on the whereabouts of the Kalyanasundram (who was not present in the house) as he had earlier stated the minister could not be traced. The Speaker then said the minister was very much available in his chamber but had not been present on the particular day when the Tamil Nadu police came to serve the summons. Sabapathy said that though they left the summons with him for serving, he could not meet Kalyanasundaram in person as he had gone out of station and added that he had advised the police to serve it through a Court.Vaithilingam then raised the issue of lack of quality in the rice distributed through PDS, which led to heated exchange between the AINRC and the Congress. Vaithilingam claimed that the rice was not consumable and K Lakshminarayanan pointed out that the government had not only failed to give rain relief, but even the free food packets distributed to the rain affected in previous years has gone undistributed this time. He sought to know whether the government would replace the present rice with new quality rice. A Mamassivayan (Congress) found fault with the government for not distributing free clothing under the government scheme in rural areas, to this Chief minister Rangasamy replied that the distribution in the Union Territory has just begun.P Rajavelu, Welfare and Tourism minister, countered Vaithilingam’s charge of lack of quality in the Public Distribution System rice by stating that the government was giving the same rice as the Congress. Vaithilingam said that it was not true and this led to an argument over the incentive given by the Congress government to procure Public Distribution Systemrice by FCI. Stating that postmortem was unnecessary, Lakshminarayanan questioned whether the government would not be able to give quality rice to people. C Jayakumar (Congress) then asked the Chief minister whether he accepted that the rice being distributed was of good quality.At this point the Speaker ordered the switching off the mikes of all members except that of Chief minister. Just as the Chief minister was giving reply by detailing the Public Distribution System scheme, the Congress and DMK MLAs walked out dissatisfied with the reply and protesting against the opportunity of not being given a chance to speak.
Comments
0 comment