The entire day’s session of the Legislative Assembly on Wednesday got washed out as the stalemate over Tuesday evening’s verbal duel between former Speaker K.R. Ramesh Kumar and Medical Education Minister K. Sudhakar continued.
Tuesday had seen a major war of words between the Treasury and the Opposition benches after Mr. Kumar took serious objection to Mr. Sudhakar reading out the Supreme Court order on disqualification of 17 Congress and JD(S) legislators who moved over to the BJP to bring down the coalition government. A heated exchange, with alleged use of abusive words, had ensued.
On Wednesday, both the BJP and the Opposition Congress members served separate notices to Speaker Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri seeking to move privilege motion against Mr. Ramesh Kumar and Dr. Sudhakar, respectively. As soon as the House met, both the BJP and the Congress members stood up and demanded first preference to speak on the motion. The Speaker had to adjourn the House twice before lunch break. A similar situation prevailed when the House reassembled after lunch break.
Amidst the din, the Speaker asked Leader of the Opposition Siddaramaiah to go ahead with the submission on privilege motion sought to be moved against Dr. Sudhakar for his alleged derogatory references, which attributed motives behind Mr. Ramesh Kumar disqualifying 17 MLAs, including himself, as the then Speaker.
But, Dr. Sudhakar intervened and appealed to the Speaker to allow him to complete his overnight speech regarding Constitution. When Mr. Siddaramaiah objected to this, Dr. Sudkahar said the BJP members had submitted a letter to the Speaker under Section 363 of the legislature proceedings seeking suspension of Mr. Ramesh Kumar from the House till the completion of the ongoing session.
In the letter, the BJP members had contented that Mr. Ramesh Kumar’s abuses against him as a Minister had tantamount to not only insulting the House, but also breaching its privileges. He argued that at least this letter should get precedence over Mr. Siddaramaiah’s privilege motion as it was a matter related to breach of privilege of the entire House.
However, Mr. Siddaramaiah insisted that he should be allowed to make his submission first as the Speaker had permitted him to speak.
Despite the Speaker’s appeals, the din increased when Mr. Siddaramaiah refused to yield, leading to adjournment of the House for sometime by the Speaker. When the situation did not change after the House reassembled, the Speaker adjourned the House for the day.
