Trinamool MLAs move privilege motion against BJP members

Sources said all of them submitted individual letters to Assembly Speaker Biman Banerjee, moving the breach of motion against BJP legislators, who, led by Leader of Opposition Suvendu Adhikari, disrupted the House on the first day of the Budget Session over alleged violence during the recent civic polls.

According to an Assembly source, “The MLAs have moved a breach of privilege motion against the BJP leaders. Each of them individually wrote to the Speaker in this regard.” During the day, the Assembly was adjourned after obituary references were made to eminent personalities, including legendary singers Lata Mangeshkar, Sandhya Mukherjee and Bappi Lahiri, former football players Subhas Bhowmick and Sanat Seth, painter Wasim Kapoor and minister Sadhan Pande, among others. A two-minute silence was observed by the members in memory of the deceased.

Unruly scenes were witnessed on the first day of the Budget session on Monday after BJP MLAs staged a protest amid sloganeering against the recent “violence” during the civic elections. Blaming the ruling Trinmool Congress (TMC) for the violence, the BJP MLAs did not allow Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar to deliver his opening speech and erupted in protest near the well of the House.

When the Governor tried to walk out of the Assembly, the ruling party MLAs stopped him, making a request for reading out at least one line from the speech. The BJP alleged that the TMC government closed all the gates of the Assembly to stop the Governor.

Meanwhile, Dhankhar on Tuesday wrote a letter to Assembly Speaker Biman Banerjee urging him to meet him at Raj Bhawan in next three days to talk about yesterday’s incidents.

“Urged Speaker WBLA for a meeting in next three days in view of unseemly ruckus and chaotic spectacle (that) unfolded in the hallowed precincts of the august WB Assembly on March 07 during Governor Address under Article 176 when decorum and propriety nosedived to (its) lowest nadir’,” Dhankhar said in a tweet. He also shared a copy of his letter to the Speaker.

“Sanctity of the temple of democracy was outraged as never before in the state. This calls for, apart from introspection, exemplary actions, at our end in togetherness, so that democratic values do not get so demeaned, capsized and trampled,” the Governor wrote in his letter.