The Hindu : Front Page : Assembly demands scrapping of N-deal

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Saturday, Jul 12, 2008
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Assembly demands scrapping of N-deal

Special Correspondent

House adopts resolution; Chief Minister says deal totally unacceptable

Congress betraying the nation: ruling parties
Opposition says LDF trying to appease China

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Amidst uproarious attempts by the Congress-led Opposition to stall the proceedings, the Kerala Legislative Assembly adopted a resolution calling upon the Centre to withdraw from the Indo-U.S. nuclear deal.

The House discussed the resolution, moved by V.N. Vasavan (CPI-M), briefly before adopting by 79 votes to none with the Opposition raising a din over the bus fare hike decided by the government on Thursday. Slogan-shouting Opposition members tore papers snatched from the table and threw files in the air even as the treasury benches discussed the resolution for close to half-an-hour.

The speeches of the ruling front members were marked by repeated taunts at the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) legislators for their party’s decision to support the UPA government if it faced a confidence vote in Parliament. P.M.A. Salam of the Indian National League (INL) confounded the misery of the IUML members by seeking a vote on the resolution, apparently to register the fact that they did not vote for the withdrawal of the Central government from the nuclear deal.

The ruling and Opposition alliance members later staged separate marches to the gate of the Assembly Complex to explain their stand to the waiting visual media teams. While the former accused the Congress and its allies of having betrayed the nation by pushing the nuclear deal, the Opposition members claimed that the LDF’s objections to the deal was meant only to appease China.

Inside the House, Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan noted that Kerala Assembly would be hailed as the first legislature in the country to have come out with a resolution seeking scrapping of the nuclear deal which, he said, was totally unacceptable to all those who cherished the country’s sovereignty and independent foreign policy. Every patriotic person had the duty to oppose the anti-national approach of the Congress which had breached all its promises to push the deal to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), he said.

Mr. Vasavan himself was scathing in his attack of the IUML and demanded to know what the League leadership had to say about the deal. The ruling front members who spoke on the resolution described the Opposition members’ demonstration in the well of the House as an act of desperation just to avoid voting on the resolution.

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