Mumbai, Dec 7 (IANS): Newly-elected legislators of the Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) alliance staged a walk-out of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly during the MLAs’ oath-taking ceremony and slammed what they termed as a ‘EVM magic’ government that has assumed power, here on Saturday.
Almost all the MLAs of the Congress-Shiv Sena (UBT)-Nationalist Congress Party (SP) and their supporting smaller parties marched out of the House slamming what they called an unprecedented ‘90 per cent majority’ regime courtesy the Electronic Voting Machines.
Samajwadi Party state President and MLA Abu Asim Azmi and another MLA were the only two MVA legislators who took oath.
Similarly, the ruling side MLAs of the BJP-Shiv Sena-NCP and their allies started the oath-taking ceremony presided over by Pro-Tem Speaker Kolambkar.
Senior MVA leaders, who led the walkout of the other MLAs, interacted with the media near the statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj in the Vidhan Bhavan precincts, declaring that they are “not against the oath ceremony” but would not take the oath today.
Congress’ state President Nana F. Patole and Vijay Wadettiwar, NCP (SP)’s General Secretary Dr Jitendra Awhad and Rohit R.R. Patil, SS (UBT)’s Group Leaders Aditya Thackeray and Bhaskar Jadhav and others said that the MahaYuti 2.0 has secured a brute majority due to the ‘EVM magic’ which they are protesting.
“They (MahaYuti) have won hugely, but there’s no joy in their camps… They are bulldozing the Opposition, not allowing them to have their say. Our protest is against this undemocratic attitude of the government. We have doubts on the EVMs,” said Aditya Thackeray.
“This government has got a huge majority but not the peoples’ support… This is the alchemy of the EVMs. We are protesting peacefully to save democracy and the Constitution. We are not against the oath-ceremony but object to the manner in which the current regime has come to power,” said Jadhav.
Awhad emphatically pointed out how the government has been trying to muffle the Opposition, not allowing them to speak and throwing them in jails when they raise issues.
“We are keeping off the oath-ceremony today because they (MahaYuti) have won the elections by EVMs manipulations,” declared a grim Patole.
Reiterating the demand to hold elections on ballot papers, Awhad later went to meet SS (UBT) President Uddhav Thackeray, who is a Member of the Legislative Council.
Patole, Wadettiwar, Awhad, Aditya Thackeray, Leader of Opposition in Council Ambadas Danve and other legislators were scheduled to hold a meeting to chart out the future strategy of the MVA in the House.