Oppn leader withdraws dharna after Speaker's assurance

CM to reply to motion on death of Tikri lady teacher today

Normalcy returned in the assembly today after the Leader of Opposition, Bhupinder Singh withdrew his dharna in the well of the House after assurance by the Speaker that Chief Minister will give his reply tomorrow on an adjournment motion on the issue of burning to death of a woman teacher in Rayagada district.

"Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik will reply to the adjournment debate on the murder of a lady teacher tomorrow," Speaker, Pradip Kumar Amat said.

As soon as House assembled today, Singh refused to budge unless the Chief Minister was asked to reply to the debate.

Unable to break the deadlock, Amat adjourned the House till 12.30 PM.

Parliamentary Affairs minister, Kalpataru Das informed the House that the Chief Minister was not scared to reply on the issue as alleged by the Opposition.

"Government is ready to discuss on the issue. He (Chief Minister) was absent because he is attending the meeting of the 14th Finance Commission for the interest of the state", Das said.

With the Congress members later returning to their respective seats, the House functioned normally.

Singh asked for the reason of dilly-dallying by the treasury bench to respond to many important issues as a result of which those could not be discussed in the House.