The treasury and the opposition benches bickered over the installation of Dr Bhim Rao Ambedkar’s portrait in the House on the first day of the two-day special session of the Assembly with both seeking to glorify their reverence for the Dalit icon while trashing the other.
Things started during zero hour when the BJP MlA Deshraj Karanwal applauded the treasury bench for installing BR Ambedkar’s portraits inside the Vidhan Sabha gallery and the Speaker’s chamber. However, unable to digest the praise being heaped on the ruling party, the former Speaker Govind Singh Kunjwal said that instead of heaping praise, the saffron lawmaker should have raised the matter of demolition and desecration of Ambedkar’s statue, something that happened in some parts of the State after BJP came to power.
Seemingly stimulated by the barb, the Opposition rose with a resolve to rob the ruling party of the credit of installing the portraits of the legend in the House. They stormed into the well of the House while shouting slogans against the State Government. While minister Madan Kaushik and MlA Karnwal rose to defend the treasury bench from the concerted Opposition onslaught, the Education Minister Arvind Pandey said that the Congress was now feigning to be reverent to the Dalit leader with ulterior motive. “History bears witness to the fact that Congress humiliated him when he was alive,” he retorted. Seeing the heat rising, the parliamentary affairs minister Prakash Pant intervened. The leader of the Opposition Indira Hridayesh said that Ambedkar transcends politics. “He is a priceless part of the national heritage,” she said.