KCR, Kishan in war of words

Hyderabad: A war of words broke out between Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao and BJP floor leader G Kishan Reddy in the State Assembly on Tuesday, when the latter asked Speaker S Madhusudhana Chary to reconsider the suspension of the Leader of the Opposition, K Jana Reddy.

Speaking after the suspension and expulsion of Congress members from the House on Tuesday, the BJP leader termed Monday incidents in the House as unfortunate and there was no place for such actions in the parliamentary democracy. Kishan Reddy said everyone takes the proceedings of the country’s parliament as the benchmark to be followed. In an obvious reference to ruling party MPs, he said, even TRS MPs were holding placards in the well of the Lok Sabha seeking reservations and creating the ruckus in the Parliament during the ongoing budget session.

Taking exception to the BJP member drawing parallels between the Monday’s incidents and the conduct of TRS MPs protests in the Parliament, the visibly angry Chief Minister questioned Kishan Reddy, “Do you support acts of anarchy?” Adding, he found fault with the BJP MLA for taking names of MPs who were not the members of the House. Even when the MPs stage a protest in the Parliament, they follow a system so that their grievances and concerns could be highlighted among 540 and odd members, the Chief Minister said.

Responding to the same, Kishan Reddy said he did not take the name of any MP and “such intolerance and bulldozing by the ruling party does not augur well,” for it, he said. Intervening at this juncture, KCR said two-thirds of the members had adopted the resolution for taking action against the Congress members and those with three to four members cannot take the House for a ride.

For this, Kishan Reddy, once again appealing for reconsideration of suspension of Jana Reddy, reminded how on an earlier occasion a TDP member, who was in Khammam, had been suspended.