Jammu: The Budget session of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly got off to a stormy start on Thursday with opposition members boycotting the Governors’ inaugural address and staging dharna over the issue of Afzal Guru’s hanging.
Protests over the Parliament attack convict’s execution also led to independent MLA Engineer Abdul Rashid being marshalled out from the Assembly for disrupting the Governor’s speech while PDP MLAs staged demonstration in front of the Assembly complex demanding that Guru’s mortal remains be handed over to his family.
Led by Leader of the Opposition Mehbooba Mufti, PDP MLAs criticised the state government for its failure to stop Guru’s execution.
“The people of Kashmir want to know whether (their state) is part and parcel of Indian democracy. If it is (then) why was Guru, whose number as a (death row) prisoner was No 28, executed earlier,” Mehbooba said.
“Why was he not allowed to meet his children and family — it is a grave injustice,” she said. PDP MLAs boycotted Governor N N Vohra’s address saying Governor was part and parcel of democracy and this was their way of registering protest over Guru’s execution.
Legislators of the Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party also boycotted the Governor’s address and, led by party MLA Harshdev Singh, sat on dharna in front of the Assembly complex demanding dismissal of the Omar Abdullah government for its “total failure on every front”.
“There is a high degree of corruption and nepotism in the administration (as also) the failure in implementing most centrally-sponsored schemes and the failure to stop the killings of sarpanches,” Singh said. As the Governor started his joint address in the Central Hall of the Legislature Complex, Independent MLA Engineer Rashid interrupted the speech while showing an allegedly controversial poster. (PTI)
