By IANS,
Jammu : Jammu and Kashmir assembly deputy speaker Sartaj Madni quit Thursday protesting the remarks made against him by the speaker in a newspaper.
As the house met, Madni walked up to the podium and raised a point about the reported remarks of Speaker Mohammad Akbar Lone.
Madni said the speaker told a local daily that he should resign as he had joined the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) protest in the house Tuesday.
The PDP was protesting in the house against the denial of permission to raise the issue of street violence in the Kashmir Valley last summer.
Madni was ignored by the speaker for a while but was allowed to make his point when some members, including Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ali Mohammad Sagar, intervened on his behalf.
Sagar said the move was “unprecedented” and added: “It has never happened in the history of the state legislature.”
Madni, who belongs to PDP, clarified he had not joined the protest, instead he was referring to the way the marshalls handled the legislators, one of whom got injured.
“But you did not take any notice of my requests,” Madni said to the speaker. Later in the day, Madani announced his resignation.
In his resignation letter, Madni charged the speaker with launching a smear campaign against the opposition.
He wrote: “You are obviously following not the established parliamentary practices and traditions to run the house but are following your party’s (National Conference) policy of beating everybody into submission.”