Budget Session: BJP creates uproar over OBC reservation

Ranchi: MLAs of the BJP on Friday created an uproar inside the Assembly over the issue of OBC reservation in panchayat polls due to which the house was adjourned once before the lunch break. During the ongoing Budget Session of the Jharkhand Assembly as soon as the house commenced its proceedings the BJP MLAs came into the well of the house and indulged in slogan shouting demanding that the panchayat elections be only conducted after providing reservation to the OBCs.

Health Minister Banna Gupta said that OBCs in Jharkhand will be given 27 percent reservation and work was on over it however the leaders of the BJP are only doing politics over the matter. He said that BJP and their leaders had reduced the OBC reservation from 27 to 14 when Babulal Marandi was the Chief Minister. Despite the slogan shouting and house not being in order Speaker Ravindranath Mahto started the question hour but as the house failed to witness normalcy he adjourned the Assembly till 12 PM. After the house recommended the MLAs of the BJP continued with their demonstrations and reached into the well of the house raising slogans.

Despite the efforts of the Speaker, the MLAs continued to press for their demands and later staged a walkout. Earlier AJSU MLA Lambodar Mahto raised the issue of many vacant constitutional posts in the state over which the government said that the matter was being considered. CPI-ML MLA Binod Singh raised the issue of unemployment allowance for the youth over which Labour Minister Satyanand Bhokta said that guidelines to provide unemployment allowance to graduate youth has not been finalised. 

On the issue of the pending honorarium of Poshan Sakhis in the state Women and Child Development Minister Joba Manjhi said that in the supplementary budget provision of Rs 38 crore has been made and the government will take a combined decision over the issue. Earlier the BJP MLAs also staged a dharna outside the Assembly over the issue of OBC reservation.