The Andhra Pradesh Assembly’s record went from bad to worse on Monday as the Congress and Telugu Desam members almost came to exchanging blows following agriculture minister Y.S. Vivekananda Reddy’s attack on the principal Opposition members.
The late YSR’s brother became emotional when he saw TD members displaying placards stating: “YSR band of thieves” and “Grandfather owned just one acre while grandson amassed `1 lakh crore”, referring to irregularities by the former chief minister in allotting lands.
Mr Vivekananda Reddy rushed to the TD members, tore off the placards and threw the pieces of paper on the Oppositions’ faces. In the process, he assaulted TD member from Dendulur, Mr Ch. Prabhakar, and accidentally slapped another TD member G. Muddukrishnama Naidu. He was joined by another minister from Kadapa, Ahmadullah in the attack.
Mr Prabhakar too reacted aggressively and manhandled the minister before pushing him away.
Though deputy speaker N. Manohar, adjourned the House immediately, there was pandemonium in the House for about five minutes as several ministers, Congress MLAs loyal to former Kadapa MP, Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy, and TD members gathering in the Well of House. They jostled and shouted at each other even as the BJP floor leader, G. Kishan Reddy, tourism minister V. Vasanth Kumar and Assembly marshals separated the agitated members.
It was a free for all for a while with the members abusing each other in unprintable language.
Significantly, the Jagan loyalists pulled up the ministers accusing them of allowing the Opposition to defame YSR.
The House was adjourned for seven hours. The TD chief, Mr N. Chandrababu Naidu, demanded that Mr Vivekananda Reddy should be immediately dismissed from the Cabinet and refused to allow the proceedings to continue unless the government agreed to constitute a Joint Legislative Committee on land allotments.
When the House was reconvened at 4.30 in the evening, the issue subsided with the Chief Minister, Mr N. Kiran Kumar Reddy, offering apologies on behalf of Mr Vivekananda Reddy who also expressed regrets about his behaviour. He, however, reiterated that he would not keep quiet at attempts to portray YSR as corrupt.
The Chief Minister said targeting individuals and resorting to mudslinging would lead to unhealthy incidents in the House. He also appealed to the Opposition to end the issue in the larger interests of the House.
Mr Chandrababu Naidu, while agreeing not to precipitate the matter further, however, made it clear that his party would not stop exposing the misdeeds of YSR just because he was dead. “The misdeeds of a person cannot be exonerated with his death,” he pointed out.
Reacting to this, the Chief Minister said that Mr Naidu had no moral right to talk about a member’s behaviour for he himself had never regretted the ugly behaviour of the TD members from Telangana during the joint address of the legislature by the Governor, Mr E.S.L. Narasimhan. He said it was also immoral to talk ill of the departed soul and offered to reply to any query relating to the policy decisions of the Congress government.