BJP MLAs walkout over police action on students

Jammu, Feb 18: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLAs on Wednesday, amid ruckus, staged en-masse walkout, in protest against the Police lathi-charge on the students, mainly girl students, seeking National Law University (NLU) in Jammu.

Walkout amid noisy scenes also saw the simultaneous abrupt adjournment of the House by the Chair for the day.

The issue erupted in the second sitting almost at the fag end of the day’s proceedings when the debate on demands for grants for the departments under the charge of the Chief Minister Omar Abdullah was in progress in the J&K Legislative Assembly.

As BJP MLA from Basohli Darshan Singh, while participating in the debate, completed his address, his party colleague MLA R S Pathania raised a point of order.

“Sir, Police have resorted to lathicharge (cane-charge) on the students seeking NLU in Jammu. The most unfortunate part is that the girl students were lathicharged and that too by male Police personnel,” Pathania pointed out, while addressing the Chair. National Conference’s chief whip Mubarak Gul, who was in the Chair, at that time.

Gul responded by saying that every issue should not be brought to the House disrupting its proceedings. “Don’t drag every issue to the House,” he asked Pathania.

BJP MLA, however, insisted that the House, which was in progress, should show its concern vis-à-vis the incident. By then all the BJP MLAs were up, with placards and posters in their hands, agitating amid slogans, thus disrupting the proceedings.

The Leader of Opposition (LoP) in J&K Legislature Sunil Sharma was, however, not in the House.

The Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, who was in the House, listening to the legislators participating in the debate, moved out of the House after some time as the disorder persisted.

Meanwhile, the Deputy Chief Minister Surinder Choudhary, targeting the BJP MLAs, accused them of “staging a drama inside the House.”

“How come, they are already having the placards and the posters with them to register protest inside the House. It simply means that everything was pre-planned. They stage-managed a protest outside and now they are agitating inside the house against lathicharge,” Choudhary countered agitating BJP legislators.

National Conference’s Nazir Gurezi dared them (BJP MLAs) to stage a similar protest outside the Lieutenant Governor’s House.

His party colleagues Abdul Majid Larmi, Hilal Akbar Lone besides the Minister for Transport Satish Sharma too rose to counter protesting BJP legislators.

By then, BJP MLA from Billawar Satish Sharma moved to the second row while his other party colleagues too converged to the front row.

Meanwhile, the Deputy Chief Minister again launched an offensive against BJP. “Sir, a narco test of all BJP MLAs should be conducted. They keep on telling lies to Jammu people to befool them. The question arises how they’ve managed placards and posters inside the House if it’s a spontaneous protest,” Choudhary said.