Bengal BJP creates ruckus in state assembly, stages walkout during Guv CV Ananda Bose's first address
Kolkata/IBNS: Opposition MLAs from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Bengal Legislative Assembly Wednesday created ruckus over Governor CV Ananda Bose's first address as they shouted slogans and tore up copies of the speech handed to them and finally staged a walkout.
The disruption was led by Bengal's Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari, who claimed the Governor was toeing the line of the state government.
According to constitutional traditions, the speech of a Governor or President in assembly or parliament is usually written by the government and their offices have little role in it.
However, the state BJP wants the Governor to adopt the practices of his predecessor Jagdeep Dhankhar, the present Vice-President, who had frequent war of words with the state government, leading to accusations of overstepping his boundaries from the Trinamool Congress.
Suvendu Adhikari said they protested only when the Governor "started speaking against the central government".
"You will see the speech is against the Union government... Instead of mentioning the realities of the state, he has read the speech written out by Mamata Banerjee," he said.
Adhikari, however, said they will "not hold the Governor responsible" since he "followed the path" shown by Mamata Banerjee.
The state BJP has been particularly upset with the Governor after he praised Mamata Banerjee at an event where she received a D. Litt degree from Kolkata's St. Xavier's University.
"We had the poet AB Vajpayee, in whose team Mamata Banerjee was also a distinguished member... We also have Winston Churchill, and we have Milton. Milton is now known as the author of Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained but back then, he was a statesman who was in charge of the Commonwealth Affairs.
"We are very glad, as people of West Bengal, in this distinguished league we have none other than Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee," the Governor had said at the event.