HYDERABAD: With just one more day to go for the end of the budget session, the Assembly guillotined as many as 40 financial demands for 2012-13 and adopted them by voice vote.
The Telangana issue continued to stall proceedings, for the third day running, with MLAs from the region insisting on a resolution for a separate state.
The House sat only for 15 minutes Wednesday during which speaker Nadendla Manohar rushed through the demands and a government Bill and a resolution expressing sympathy for the families of youths who committed suicide in support of the Telangana cause in recent days.
The speaker moved the motion on behalf of the House, and made an impassioned appeal to young people in Telangana not to lose heart.
‘’A solution to any vexatious issue can be found in an amicable manner through discussions.
There are several options available in our parliamentary democratic system.
Suicides are not a solution,” he said.
But for that moment of poignancy in the House, it was all pandemonium again.
Within five minutes of the House being called to order at 9 am, TDP and TRS legislators surrounded the speaker’s podium shouting Telangana slogans.
Manohar adjourned proceedings for 15 minutes.
The House reassembled at 11.20 am but peace lasted no more than five minutes again.
While TRS and TDP MLAs besieged the podium, Congress MLAs from the region stood up near their seats, taking up the separate state chorus.
Amid the din, the speaker ordered that the demands for grants be moved and rushed trhough.
This business took all of five minutes during which the government managed to introduce and adopt the Andhra Pradesh Excise and the Andhra Pradesh (Regulation of Trade in Indian Made Foreign Liquor, Foreign Liquor) Acts (Amendment) Bill, 2012.
The next adjournment was for ten minutes.
When it sat again a second time, the opposition stuck to its guns and Manohar then called it a day.