KEEPING TABS ON POWER POLITICS IN PUNJAB, HARYANA, HIMACHAL PRADESH AND JAMMU AND KASHMIR
of the session, but Sunam MLA Aman Arora went a step further. He brought a lock and flashed it in the House to show his protest, saying that the assembly should be locked in case the laid-down procedure is not followed. When the party legislators staged a walkout and protested outside, he kept showing it. “Need to prepare in advance for effective communication,” he said. Similarly, two other party MLAS, Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer and Baljinder Kaur, protested against rising unemployment by selling peanuts out the state assembly. Needless to say, the strategy worked well as their pictures were found space in several newspapers. of former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda. With Rahul Gandhi at the helm as the Congress president, there was speculation that the old guard in the party would get overlooked and the young guns would rule the roost. Hooda, a twotime chief minister, has not been able to dislodge state Congress president Ashok Tanwar, leaving his supporters wondering about his clout and equation with the party high command. However, with the Congress high command backing Gehlot and Nath, the supporters of Hooda can smell a chance for him if the party gets voted to power in the state next year. mood with his hilarious remarks. During a discussion on the resolution to declare cow as “rashtra mata” (mother of the nation) in the just-concluded winter session of the Himachal Vidhan Sabha, speaker Rajeev Bindal allowed Dhawala to put forth his point of view, telling him to finish in two minutes. “Adhyakshji, do minute to gai ki punchh pakadne mein lag jate hain. Main do minute mein kya bol kunga,” (Speaker sir, two minutes are not sufficient to catch hold of tail of cow. What I will be able to say in two minutes),” he quipped, leaving the members in splits. holes in the Bills tabled by the Jai Ram Thakur government in the House, pointing out grammatical mistakes, which, he said, changed the very essence. Initiating a debate on a Bill presented for setting up Higher Education Council, Singha questioned the words “famous academician”. “A place, a song or building is called famous while academicians are always renowned,” he said. During a discussion on a Bill to set up the Cow Service Commission, the MLA said that “preservation and conservation” can’t be used for cow. “While blood is preserved, forests are conserved. How will you preserve a cow?” he asked.
He, then, went on to add that even nursery students know the basics.