The opposition BJP today staged a walkout from the Himachal Pradesh Assembly in protest against Speaker B B L Butail's refusal to allow former chief minister P K Dhumal to ask supplementaries.
Dhumal wanted to make some queries on a question regarding the need for conducting a fresh survey of below poverty line (BPL) families which was last done in 2003 but the Speaker did not yield and the BJP members staged a walkout from the House.
Reacting to the walkout, Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh said BJP's action was "surprising".
He wondered what really provoked the BJP members tostage walkout when the minister was replying to the queries of Congress MLAs, Sanjay Rattan and Asha Kumari, who had asked the main question.
Singh said, "The state has theright to know why walkout was staged and I have not seen such a walkout during my long parliamentary career and it appears that the opposition thinks that walkout is a part of their job."
"I propose that the opposition members should not be paid the day's allowances as they have chosen to leave the House," Singh remarked and also asked the Speaker, "Sir, you should be knowing the reason".
Later, when BJP MLAs returned to the House for business, Dhumal posed a counter question to Chief Minister, "Some people were asking the reasons for our walkout but why did you (pointing to Chief Minister) leave the House the other day when BJP MLA Suresh Bhardwaj was on the presiding chair. We also want to know the reasons," he said.
Dhumal clarified that since the Speaker did not give the opposition an opportunity to raise the issue on BPL list despite having raised hands, there was no option but to lodge a protest.
Replying to the main question, Rural Development Minister Anil Sharma admitted that no survey of the BPL families has been done since 2003.
This was because of certain guidelines issued by the Ministry of Rural Development as a special social-economic caste census was done sometime back and thereafter fresh instructions were awaited
However, three-stage house-to-house surveys have been done to update the list, which only gram Sabhas are empowered to do.
Turning down the suggestions of some members that the Sub Divisional Magistrates should be empowered to delete the names of ineligible families, the minister said that only Gram Sabhas can include or delete the names from the BPL list.
