Opposition protests in Assam assembly - without naming corrupt

GUWAHATI - From cymbals to placards, many things made an unusual appearance in the Assam assembly Friday as part of vociferous opposition protests to demand the dismissal of ministers allegedly involved in the multimillion rupee scam in North Cachar Hills district.

The only thing missing was the names of the allegedly corrupt ministers.

We don’t want to name the ministers, although we know their names, Chandra Mohan Patowary, president of Assam’s main opposition Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), told IANS.

Assembly proceedings for the past four days have been stalled with the opposition demanding that the corrupt ministers be dropped from the cabinet.

Everybody knows who the corrupt ministers are and so there is no need to take names, said Bhuban Pegu, another vocal legislator belonging to the Gana Shakti Party.

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator Rameshwar Teli said, No, no, I don’t want to take their names as it is all known to the people of Assam.”

It was no different with the Asom United Democratic Front (AUDF).

Aditya Langthasa, a legislator of AUDF, said, The government should know who the corrupt ministers are. In fact, ministers of all departments where corruption has taken place in the North Cachar Hills district should be dropped.

The financial scam in the North Cachar Hills is currently under probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation, the enquiry having been referred to the apex investigating agency by the Assam government in 2008.

How can I simply drop a minister or some ministers without any charge? No ministers in my cabinet have so far been interrogated or named by any investigating agency. The opposition demand is simply obnoxious and nothing but politics, Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi told IANS.

If the opposition knows the names of the ministers, they should on their own lodge a complaint with the CBI or hand over the list of corrupt ministers to me.

On Friday, BJP legislator Prasanta Phukan was expelled from the house for two days by the speaker when he started playing a cymbal during question hour while the entire opposition once again on its feet demanding the dismissal of corrupt ministers.

This is election season in Assam and the opposition is simply making this ruckus to draw the attention of the media and politicise the issue without any hard evidence, the Gogoi said.

A politician-militant-bureaucrat-contractor nexus involving government funds siphoned off in the North Cachar Hills district was unravelled by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in 2009 after the state government asked for a probe.

During investigations it was found that crores of development funds were channelised to a militant group, the Dima Haolam Daogah. The case was later handed over to the CBI since it involved politicians and bureaucrats.

CBI to has not named or interrogated any ministers so far.