By IANS
New Delhi : Trinamul Congress leader Mamata Banerjee’s outbursts over violence in Nandigram and disruptions by MPs from Orissa over the national mining policy created chaos in the Lok Sabha Wednesday, leading to adjournments.
The issue of violence in West Bengal’s Nandigram area that had stalled the parliamentary proceedings for many days earlier, resurfaced Wednesday when Banerjee raised the issue.
Although Speaker Somnath Chatterjee asked her to take seat as she had not given any prior notice to raise the issue, Banerjee, who had sent her resignation from the Lok Sabha to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh last month, refused to oblige.
As Banerjee went on shouting accusation against the West Bengal’s ruling Marxists, Chatterjee adjourned the house for half an hour at 1 p.m.
Over 35 people have been killed in Nandigram since January, when the state government had made plans to acquire farmland for a proposed special economic zone (SEZ). The decision, later scrapped, sparked a turf war between the ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) and a Trinamul Congress-backed group of local villagers.
Banerjee’s uproar came immediately after Parliamentary Affairs Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi requested the chair to cancel the lunch hour in order to pass two important legislations.
Dasmunsi sought the speaker’s permission to take up the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Bill, 2007 as it needed to be sent to the Rajya Sabha Thursday.
When the Lok Sabha met at 1.30 p.m., MPs from Orissa stood up and demanded that the prime minister discuss the draft of the national mineral policy with the state chief ministers.
The MPs from the state’s ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) and its ally Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who stormed the well of the house, went back to their seat when Home Minister Shivraj Patil made a statement that the centre had been in consultation with the representatives of the concerned states and industries.
“The prime minister and other ministers are only pleased to meet the state chief ministers and other representatives… The government is in the process of consultation for finalising the national mineral policy,” Patil said adding that it would come before the MPs before finalisation.
However, the MPs contested Patil’s remarks that there had been differences of views among the chief ministers of mineral-rich Orissa, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand and Karnataka.
“He is misleading the house. We have a memorandum jointly signed by the chief ministers of these states with us,” BJD leader Brij Kishore Tripathy said.
As acrimonious scenes continued, Varkkala Radhakrishnan, who was in the Chair, adjourned the proceedings till 2.30 p.m.