TNR Desk
DHARAMSHALA: Opposition MLAs protesting against the ruling regime during Assembly sessions have been common scenes in the past, but the MLAs of the party in power staging a demonstration on the Vidhan Sabha premises has been rare. But this happened at Tapovan in Dharamshala on the fourth day of the five-day winter session of the Himachal Pradesh on Friday (December 22, 2023).
Minutes after opposition BJP MLAs, continuing with their innovative daily morning practice of protesting against the Congress government’s “unfulfilled guarantees”, a few Congress legislators too reached the House complex carrying banners in their hands. The banners spoke of promises made by the BJP in others states, including the ‘Rs 3,000 Laadli Behna’ scheme in Madhya Pradesh, which had not been fulfilled.
Leading the protest was Shahpur Congress MLA Kewal Singh Pathania, who alleged that the BJP was adopting double-standards when it came to public dealing. “The Narendra Modi government failed to fulfill its promise made to the people of India in 2014 of providing Rs 15 lakh to each and every citizen if the BJP won elections. Nine years down the line, there is no talk of the money. There are numerous such unkept promises,” he said.
Pathania also targeted the BJP for allegedly failing to provide adequate relief to Himachal Pradesh in the aftermath of the devastating rain disaster in July-August 2023. “The Himachal government sent as assessment report to the Centre estimating its rain losses at around Rs 10,000 crore. But what the Modi government gave was Rs 600 crore, and that too from the disaster relief fund that would have anyways reached the state.
CM Sukhu, on the other hand, for the first time in any state’s history created a special fund to compensate the people who had suffered loss of lives, houses and land,” the first-term legislator said. He alleged that the Himachal BJP leadership had failed to convince their own party-ruled Modi regime at the Centre to extend a special package to Himachal in view of the losses caused by the devastating rain.
The BJP, for its part, has been claiming that the Centre had provided “sufficient grants” to Himachal after the rain disaster.
