After being on opposition Shiv Sena-BJP’s target on Tuesday, deputy chief minister R R Patil hit back strongly on Wednesday, killing two birds in one arrow.
NAGPUR: After being on opposition Shiv Sena-BJP’s target on Tuesday, deputy chief minister R R Patil hit back strongly on Wednesday, killing two birds in one arrow.
Not only did he settle the scores with the opposition for their persistent attacks, but also got the Rs4,800-crore supplementary demands passed amid din in the legislative assembly.
A scattered and helpless opposition could only see the high drama unfold before itself, even as the ruling combine clobbered them. It all began when Revenue Minister Narayan Rane smelt rat in the withdrawal of a question by four Shiv Sena members on Tuesday.
The written question, that pertained to irregularity in a land deal involving Raj Developers, was posed by Sena members — Gajanan Kirtikar, Eknath Shinde, Dagdu Sapkal and Sharad Dhamale.
The question was later shown as scrapped by hand in the question-list distributed among members. When Rane on Wednesday noticed that Shiv Sena member Sanjay Rathod is not in the House at the time Speaker called for his question, he sprung to his feet.
Taking a cue, Rane alleged that the Sena members had withdrawn their questions on Tuesday after taking bribe from the builder and immediately sought an inquiry into the matter. Rathod was actually attending to a relative seriously hurt in an accident. His question pertained to irregularities in mass marriage function in an Amravati village.
However, when Speaker Babasaheb Kuperkar told the House about having got a letter from the four Sena members seeking a withdrawal of their question on Tuesday, the members, barring Kirtikar who was not present in the House, denied having sent any letter to him. They also claimed that it did not bear their signatures.
Even as the mystery about the withdrawal deepened, the ruling combine demanded a CID inquiry into the matter, sending the opposition into the defensive.
Sensing an opportunity, Patil said a CID inquiry would be initiated into the matter, given its seriousness. The ruling combine’s members stormed the well seeking action against the opposition members, the House had to be adjourned four times following pandemonium.
When the House reassembled for the fifth time, Congress-NCP members sought an apology from the opposition leader Ramdas Kadam for having sent a fake letter to the Speaker and continued raising slogans in the well. Amidst this ruckus, the chair called for supplementary demands and the ruling combine got it passed by a voice vote.
Meanwhile, refuting charges that the Hindustan Construction Company had stalled the work on Bandra-Worli sea link project, Minister for Public Works (Public Undertakings) Anil Deshmukh on Wednesday assured that the sea link would be thrown open for traffic by December 2008, failing which the government would initiate action against the contractor firm “as per the conditions under the agreement”.
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