The vote-on-account in the Madhya Pradesh Vidhan Sabha, on Tuesday, was passed by a voice vote amidst an uproar by the opposition which wanted to debate the scams in the Professional Education Board (PEB). Speaker Sitasharan Sharma proceeded with the vote-on-account of Rs. 51,674.82 crores for expenditure to be incurred between April 1 and July 31 and the third supplementary budget of this fiscal amounting to Rs. 745.93 crores amidst the ruckus created by Congress MLAs.
Led by Mukesh Nayak and Sunderlal Tiwari, in the absence of Opposition Leader Satyadev Katare, Congressmen sat in the well of the house demanding that the probe into the recruitment and medical entrance scams be handed over to the Central Bureau of Investigation.
The government has admitted that 1000 out of the 1.47 lakh public recruitments since 2007 were fraudulent. The Medical Education Department has also cancelled the admissions of 317 medicos, although no politician has been booked in the scam yet. Although, the PEB scam was a starred question on Monday, it could not be debated due to the lack of time. Congress MLAs had marched to the assembly on March 3, wearing black aprons to protest against the scam and the non-payment of relief for the soya crop lost in rains in year.
Shivraj backtracks
CM Shivraj Chouhan, on Tuesday, watered down his call for a day-long state-wide bandh and road blockade on March 6. He said, “As there are exams for students, there will not be road blockades but farmers will sit on protest in their villages. There will be a bandh from 10 am to 2 pm during which me and my cabinet will go on hunger strike against the unconstitutional behaviour of the centre.” In 2011, Mr. Chouhan called of his fast against the Centre for frost-hit farmers after an assurance from PM Manmohan Singh.
He added that the reasons for the bandh were the centre ignoring MP’s request for a Rs. 5000 crore relief package for crops lost in rain and hail, the PM not meeting him during his Delhi-trip last Sunday, Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Agency’s (APEDA) opposition to a Geographical Indication tag to Madhya Pradesh for Basmati rice and, for the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Limited (NAFED) to procure gram at Rs. 3100 per quintal, that is at Rs. 900 above the market rate.
