The proceedings in the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly ended on Wednesday without Electricity Minister P. Thangamani giving his scheduled reply to the debate on demand for grants for his department following vociferous protests from DMK legislators led by Opposition leader M.K. Stalin demanding to expunge certain remarks made by an AIADMK MLA. Mr. Stalin and his party colleagues then staged a sit-in dharna in the House for around 10 minutes.
Amidst commotion, Speaker P. Dhanapal, who had earlier extended the session in the afternoon, announced that the proceedings of the day stood wound up and said the Minister would give his reply on Thursday.
The issue began when AIADMK legislator S. Muthiah (Paramakudi) made a reference to “89 scarecrows” in his speech, prompting a huge uproar by DMK members in the House, who strongly opposed the remarks (as they interpreted it to be a reference to the strength of the DMK members in the Assembly) and urged the Speaker to expunge them. However, the Speaker said there was “nothing unparliamentary” in the comments made by the legislator and refused to expunge them.
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Since Chief Minister Jayalalithaa too intervened and contended that there was nothing unparliamentary in the comments made by her party member, all DMK legislators were on their feet and demanded expunging of the comments and raised slogans, disrupting the proceedings of the House.
Congress MLAs and the lone IUML member, K.A.M. Muhammed Abubacker, too supported the DMK’s stand.
The Speaker stood by his decision on not to expunge the comments and attempted to pacify the DMK members but in vain.
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Subsequently, the Speaker gave Mr. Stalin a chance to speak, but his comments were expunged by Mr. Dhanapal. Ms. Jayalalithaa intervened again to ask why the DMK members assumed that Mr. Muthaiah’s reference about the “89 scarecrows” were aimed at them, when her party member hasn’t named anyone. As the pandemonium continued, despite attempts by the Speaker to urge them to take their seats, Ms. Jayalalithaa left the House.
Soon loud slogans by the DMK members filed the House and the Speaker eventually asked Mr. Muthiah, who triggered the uproarious reactions, to take his seat. The Speaker then called Mr. Thangamani to reply to the debate on demand for grants for his department. But the Minister couldn’t speak in view of the loud sloganeering by the Opposition MLAs.
A verbal duel between AIADMK MLA P. Vetrivel (Perambur) and DMK MLA Y. Prakaash (Thalli) added to the volatile situation in the House.
Later, Mr. Stalin was given another chance to speak, but again his comments were expunged by the Chair. This again drew loud protests from the Opposition benches prompting the Speaker to wind up the day’s proceedings without the scheduled reply to be given by Mr. Thangamani.
However, DMK members led by Mr. Stalin and Mr. Duraimurugan stayed put in the House and staged a sit-in dharna for around 10 minutes before exiting.
Though Cong MLAs and the lone IUML member supported the DMK, the Speaker stood his ground