Kerala Speaker AN Shamseer’s office in the Assembly complex on Wednesday witnessed an unprecedented protest by Opposition Congress-UDF members accusing him of being biased in the House.
Opposition leader VD Satheesan on Wednesday alleged that Kerala Assembly “Speaker is denying our rights to speak” in the house.
“Today we tried to raise the issue regarding women security in Kerala. Recently, a school girl aged 16 was brutally attacked by four criminals in Thiruvananthapuram district. We have gone through the statistics regarding the violence against women and children in the state. It is increasing day by day. We tried to raise this issue in the assembly but unfortunately the speaker denied us the oppurtunity on flimsy grounds. For the last so many days the speaker is denying our rights to speak in the assembly. Yesterday we met the speaker and expressed our displeasure but he said he was helpless,” VD Satheesan told media.
The opposition leader added, “The governor also does not want to answer our questions. We are 41 in terms of strength in the assembly while they (ruling party) are 99. From the very beginning they have appointed a ten membered back bench to interrupt and disrupt my speech. This will be the first instance in the history of Kerala assembly that 10 members of the ruling party try to interrupt the speech of the leader of the opposition.”
Satheesan also lashed out at Vijayan and said that the CM is trying to imitate Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The opposition legislators have been protesting for some days against the Speaker’s decision denying them a nod to present notice for their adjournment motion continuously on various pressing issues.
Protests erupted early in the House when Shamseer announced that their notice for adjournment motion on women’s security could not be taken up. Raising slogans and holding a banner saying ‘Speaker should show justice’, they later walked out of the House and marched to the Speaker’s office in the same complex.
