Thaindian News

Shimla, Aug 3 (IANS) Congress lawmakers Monday stalled the proceedings at the inaugural session of the Himachal Pradesh assembly for almost an hour and then staged a walkout over the appointment of chief parliamentary secretaries.
Congress legislators disrupted the proceedings and sought discussion on the issue immediately after the question hour. Speaker Tulsi Ram, however, said the issue did not warrant any discussion at this stage.

This agitated the Congress legislators and they staged a walkout from the assembly.

Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal, of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), tried to pacify the opposition members, but in vain.

The state government last month inducted three chief parliamentary secretaries — Satpal Satti, Virender Kanwar and Sukh Ram Chaudhry.

State Congress chief Kaul Singh Thakur later told reporters informally outside the assembly: “Dhumal had first got the appointments of chief parliamentary secretaries and parliamentary secretaries in the previous Congress government quashed through the state high court and later when former chief minister Virbhadra Singh introduced a bill in the assembly to make such appointments, Dhumal opposed it too.”

He said despite having enacted the law in this regard, the Congress government did not appoint any chief parliamentary secretaries.

The 25-day session began Monday afternoon.