BELAGAVI : The winter session held at Suvarna Vidhana Soudha will be deferred for a day following a call by opposition parties for an all-India bandh against demonetisation of high-value currency notes by the NDA government. The Business Advisory Committee, chaired Speaker K B Koliwad, on Friday decided to defer the session on Monday and extend it till Saturday.
As the Congress is strongly opposing demonetisation and has staged protests along with other parties, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah maintained that the session should be deferred on Monday as they want to redeploy 3,000 policemen now on duty for the session at Belagavi. He felt that the policemen need to be redeployed to maintain law and order on the bandh day and also in the interest of security of the legislators attending the session.
BJP leader Jagadish Shettar and others insisted that the session be conducted on Monday. They said that deferring it for a day will defeat the purpose as many issues related to North Karnataka region and other core issues had to be taken up.
JD(S) leader H D Revanna suggested that the session be extended for a day. He said that more time should be given to debate public issues and carry out business, which was accepted by the committee.
As the leaders failed to arrive at a conclusion, Shettar said deferring the session for a day was not a right move. He added that BJP opposes it and walked out of the meeting.
It may be recalled that Congress and JD(S) members in both the Houses have spoken against demonetisation by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government and its impact on economy, development works, common man, poor and the farming community.
The state government and JD(S) have written separate letters to the Centre urging it to allow co-operative banks to accept demonetised currency, which would allow farmers to repay loans.