By IANS,
Chandigarh : Legislators of the opposition Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) were suspended from the Haryana assembly by the speaker Wednesday for disrupting the house.
Chaos prevailed inside the house following an adjournment motion brought in the assembly on the issue of conviction and sentencing of Leader of Opposition and INLD president Om Prakash Chautala by a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court in the Junior Basic Teachers’ (JBT) recruitment scam recently.
INLD legislators entered the well of the house and shouted slogans against the adjournment motion. They said that Chautala had appealed against the conviction and that the matter was now sub-judice.
A lone Shiromani Akali Dal legislator was also suspended by the speaker along with the 27 INLD members.
Speaker Kuldeep Sharma had to adjourn the house twice for 15 minutes each after the INLD legislators created a ruckus.
The motion was moved by Congress legislator Sampat Singh, who was once a close confidant of Chautala.
Sampat Singh, who was the state finance minister in Chautala’s ministry (1999-2005) but is now with the Congress, moved the adjournment motion under Rule 66 of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Haryana assembly.
He sought the removal of Chautala as member of the assembly (MLA) and also as leader of opposition.
In his motion, Sampat Singh said that Chautala had been convicted and sentenced to 10 years’ rigorous imprisonment in the JBT teachers’ recruitment scam by a CBI court recently.
“Om Prakash Chautala has no moral right to continue as member of the legislative assembly of Haryana and also the leader of opposition in such circumstances,” Sampat Singh’s motion read.
Chautala and his legislator son Ajay were sentenced to 10 years’ rigorous imprisonment in the JBT teachers’ scam by a CBI court in Rohini, New Delhi, last month. Fifty-three others, including INLD legislator Sher Singh Badshami and two bureaucrats, were also convicted. The scam related to the recruitment of over 3,200 teachers in Haryana’s government schools, allegedly by replacing the list of candidates originally selected with one that was presented by those in power at the time.
The recruitments were made in the year 2000.