The Madhya Pradesh government on Tuesday presented a Rs 1,798-crore first adjunct Budget amid unprecedented ruckus in the Assembly. Although Finance Minister Raghavji could not table the Bill, it was, however, taken on record. Majority of the Budget, Rs 800 crore approximately, would go to the government-owned power sector utilities as working capital in the form of financial assistance.
An approximate amount of Rs 258 crore would be earmarked for foodgrain procurement and a fair amount of Rs 101 crore would go for covered cap construction to store procured grain. “We have made provisions for other important necessities like Rs 150 crore for the public works department, Rs 36 crore for the police force, Rs 60 crore for agriculture, Rs 30 crore for panchayati raj, Rs 20 crore for public health engineering and Rs 38 core for travel arrangement of old-age pilgrims,” Raghavji told Business Standard. “Most of the supplementary budget will go on non-plan expenditure.”
Earlier, when the House assembled for the day, commotion began as Congress legislators, led by Opposition leader Ajay Singh, staged sit-in protest outside the chamber of the Speaker of the House, Ishwardas Rahani, blocking his way to the Assembly. Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan was also confined to the speaker's chamber.
The Opposition members were demanding a debate on the recently conducted income-tax raids and reported seizure of money and property from two businessmen, Dilip Suryavanshi and Sudhir Sharma, who were considered close to senior BJP leaders, including several ministers in the Cabinet.
Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan called it a black day in the history of the state Assembly.
After the ‘Question Hour’, when the Speaker’s panel member Gyan Singh proceeded further for House proceedings, the Congress members led by deputy leader of the Opposition, Choudhary Rakesh Singh came to the House and started reading out an Opposition sponsored no-confidence motion against the Speaker, accusing him of not being impartial and siding with the government.
Before leaving the Chair, Gyan Singh first adjourned the House sine die but later corrected and adjourned it till tomorrow. Amid pandemonium, another member on the Speaker's panel, Kedar Nath Shukla, came to the House and began its proceedings without the mandatory bell being pressed to re-convene the House. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Narottam Mishra and Industries Minister Kailash Vijaywargiya then moved a condemnation motion against the Congress party which was passed by a voice vote.
As acrimonious scenes continued, Shukla asked the ruling party legislators to move the censure motion amid slogan shouting by the Congress legislators. Later, Shukla announced the censure motion against the Congress legislators has been passed by 'voice vote'.
Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan called it a black day in the state Assembly’s history. However, Chaturvedi clarified he had given a notice for adjournment motion this morning to the Assembly secretary Rajkumar Pandey but Speaker Ishwar Das Rohani ignored it, thereby prompted them to take this step.
