BHUBANESWAR: Continuing their hostile approach towards Minister of State for Home Dibya Shankar Mishra for his alleged involvement in the murder of Mamita Meher, a lady teacher in Kalahandi, Congress legislators staged a walkout in protest when Speaker SN Patro allowed the Minister to make a statement on the law and order situation in the State.
Party members created a ruckus in the Assembly when the Speaker rejected the demand of Taraprasad Bahinipati to instruct Parliamentary Affairs Minister Bikram Keshari Arukha to make a statement on the law and order situation in place of Mishra.
Raising the issue during zero hours, the Congress legislator said since the House will discuss the adjournment notice of BJP on the law and order situation, the kidnapping and murder of Mamita is bound to be discussed. Since Mishra is linked to the murder case, it would not be appropriate to allow the Minister to give a statement, Bahinipati said.
When Patro rejected the prayer of the Congress member stating that law and order is a wide subject, Congress MLAs trooped into the well of the house and raised slogans against the State government. Amid uproar, the Speaker allowed the junior Home Minister to make the statement. The Congress MLAs walked out in protest and sat on dharna near the Gandhi statue on Assembly premises. Later, Congress legislators led by their leader Narasingha Mishra met Governor Ganeshi Lal and submitted a memorandum to him stating that allowing a tainted minister to make a statement in the Assembly was not acceptable in Parliamentary democracy.
Though the BJP supported this demand of Congress, members of the saffron party stayed put and participated in the debate. Opposition chief whip Mohan Majhi, who had served notice for a debate on the admissibility of an adjournment motion on poll violence and deteriorating law and order, then led a walkout by party members, expressing displeasure over the reply of the minister.
“How can Ministers accused of having connections with murder accused address the Assembly?” said Mishra, leader of the Congress legislature party. Mishra said the police probed into the woman teacher’s murder case but did not investigate allegations of the Minister’s involvement in the matter. Therefore, the investigation is not complete, he added.
The Minister of State for Home in his statement said the law and order situation in the State is by and large peaceful and the State Election Commission conducted the panchayat polls smoothly. Earlier, the winter session of the Assembly was a washout on the Opposition's demand for dismissal of the tainted Minister from the council of ministers.