Even as the Gujarat assembly rocked over a Karnataka-like porngate incident on Tuesday, assembly speaker Ganpat Vasava on Wednesday formed a privilege committee to look into the matter. On Tuesday, two BJP MLAs were accused of watching objectionable material on a tablet in the house, which was later reported to the speaker by a vernacular journalist.
While in their defense both BJP MLAs Shankar Choudhary from Radhanpur and Jetha Bharwad of Sehera in Panchmahal denied allegations of watching objectionable content on his tablet, members of the opposition party Congress shouted slogans for much part of the house before being suspended for a day by the speaker.
A local journalist had submitted a video clip which showed both the MLAs watching images on a tablet which was unclear.
Denying the allegations, Choudhary told reporters, "I was only doing some official work. t is a conspiracy to defame me and my party." The speaker also termed the allegations as "serious" and announced setting up of a privilege committee to look into the matter. On the other hand, the tablet was handed over to the secretary of the assembly to be probed for the alleged contents.
However, Congress MLAs were suspended for the rest of the house after continual protests and slogan shouting in the wake of the incident. Twice in the day, Congress MLAs resorted to protests and slogan shouting forcing the speaker to adjourn the house for one hour and again for half an hour. After continued protests, the speaker suspended the Congress MLAs for the day before asking Choudhary to clarify about the allegations.
Meanwhile, BJP's state unit general secretary Vijay Rupani also denied the allegations and said the same were cooked up by Congress. "I believe that they were not watching such material on the tablet. However, if required we will inquire about the incident," said Rupani.