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Telangana Chief Minister Revanth Reddy has announced a comprehensive probe into the incidents of alleged abuse of the Assembly Speaker and alleged assault on police personnel by Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) legislators on September 7, the first day of the monsoon session of the legislature.
Speaking in the Assembly on September 9, CM Revanth alleged a conspiracy behind the incidents of September 7 and said that stringent action would be taken against the alleged “conspirators” and those who were “complicit in the conspiracy.”
The controversy began on the morning of September 7, when the police obstructed BRS legislators wearing black T-shirts with anti-Congress slogans from entering the Assembly. During the scuffle, two BRS MLCs, Tata Madhusudhan and Naveen Kumar Reddy, allegedly made offensive remarks about the Speaker Gaddam Prasad Kumar, who belongs to a Scheduled Caste.
According to an FIR registered by the Saifabad police, when police personnel allegedly began pulling Tata Madhusudhan by his pants, he said, “Did the Speaker tell you to pull at people’s pants? Which son of a wh*** gave you the power to do so?”
Naveen Kumar allegedly asked the police personnel, “Who gave you the order, ask that Speaker to come here,” while referring to the Speaker informally.
The case was registered under Section 352 (intentional insult) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and provisions of the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
Both the MLCs were arrested and released on bail after a court rejected their judicial remand. They were also suspended from the Legislative Council for the remainder of the monsoon session on September 8.
Meanwhile, 22 BRS MLAs, including party working president KTR and former Minister T Harish Rao, were also suspended from the Assembly for the rest of the monsoon session on September 9, after they surrounded the Speaker’s podium and raised slogans demanding justice.
The BRS members were protesting reported statements by Congress members that they wished former CM and BRS chief K Chandrashekar Rao was dead. They also said that the suspended BRS MLCs had not made any insulting remarks against the Speaker.
BRS had earlier criticised the Congress government over police personnel allegedly manhandling the party’s women legislators, Sabitha Indra Reddy and Sunitha Lakshma Reddy, during the scuffle on September 7. Congress on the other hand had alleged that BRS leaders themselves manhandled the police personnel.
Amid the controversy, on September 8, Congress members, including Dalit party workers, reportedly held a ‘chaavu dappu’ (funeral drum-beating procession) near KCR’s farmhouse in Erravalli. A day later, BRS members reportedly sprinkled turmeric water on the roads near the farmhouse. CM Revanth has alleged that this was a ‘purification ritual’, comparing it to the ‘purification ritual’ allegedly held at Haldwani’s Ramlila Maidan after Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge’s rally in early August.
CM Revanth alleged in the Assembly on September 9 that KCR had a “feudal” approach towards Dalits. He also alleged that KCR had conspired to stir controversy to avoid debate in the Assembly about alleged land scams carried out under the previous BRS government.
He alleged that KCR had instigated his party legislators against the Dalit Speaker.
The Chief Minister said there was no difference between those who carried out various terror incidents such as the 2001 Parliament attack, the 2008 Mumbai terror attack, the Pulwama attack, and those who insulted the Speaker.
He said that Dalit groups held a protest rally while beating drums at KCR’s farmhouse, but KCR did not invite them in and address their concerns. “Instead, the BRS chief acted irrationally and caused grave insult by ordering the ‘purification’ of the ground where Dalits had walked,” Revanth alleged.