RAJ KUMAR
Ranchi, Aug1: BJP legislators did not allow the house of Jharkhand Assembly to run on the second day of the Monsoon session on the issue of the arrest of three Congress legislators by West Bengal police and the situation of drought in the state.
As the house began at 11 am, legislators went into the well and first demanded the dismissal of the three MLAs, Irfan Ansari (Jamtara), Naman Vixel Kongari (Simdega) and Rajesh Kachchap (Khijri), from whom West Bengal police recovered Rs 50 lakh cash on Saturday evening. They also raised the demand for declaring Jharkhand as drought-hit.
Though Parliamentary Affairs Minister Alamgir Alam agreed to discuss the issue of drought in the second half of the house, BJP legislators did not return to their seats. Assembly speaker Rabindranath Mahto also requested them to return but they did not return and kept on disturbing the house.
Finally at 11.26 am, the house was adjourned till 12.30 pm.
Earlier, when the BJP legislators were disturbing the house to press for their demand for the dismissal of the Congress legislators, MLA Pradeep Yadav accused the BJP of killing democracy.
He said that BJP leaders were trying to disturb the democratically elected government of Jharkhand. He also alleged the BJP of horse trading. He was of the opinion that BJP legislators are creating a ruckus by coming near the well to divert them from the issue.
Outside the house, BJP legislators alleged Jharkhand in-charge of Congress party Avinash Pande of implicating their three legislators. Bokaro MLA Biranchi Narayan alleged Pande of being hand in gloves with corrupts, saying the latter comes every week in the state to collect shares.
Narayan said it was wrong on the part of Congress to allege Assam’s chief minister of attempting to topple the Jharkhand government saying the latter had a 22-year association with the Congress. He said that the amount recovered from Congress MLAs is the share of illegal amounts collected by the loot of mineral wealth in the state under the leadership of the JMM government.
