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PRESS TRUST OF INDIA
BHOPAL, Feb 8: A committee of legislators would go into all the aspects of the killing of college student Preeti Shrivastava at Ambikapur on December 3 last year, the Madhya Pradesh Assembly Speaker Sriniwas Tiwari announced today. Preeti was crushed to death by a jeep driven by four youths, all of whom had later been arrested and refused bail.
The Speaker announced the formation of the Legislative committee after a 10-minute adjournment forced by Opposition BJP members, who shouted slogans against the Government in the well of the house during Zero Hour.
The BJP members had staged a dharna on February 4, after the House discussed an adjournment motion on the killing of Preeti. The dharna, which continued through out the night, was suspended the next morning when BJP members marched to the Raj Bhavan and submitted a memorandum on the issue to the State governor, Dr Bhai Mahavir.
This morning, the BJP allowed the Question Hour as usual, but during the Zero Hour, its members again raised the demand forsuspending the Collector and Superintendent of Police of Surguja district, whose headquarters is Ambikapur.
Before the House was adjourned due to slogan shouting by BJP members, there were some heated exchanges between the ruling and Opposition members on the issue.
The Chief Minister Digvijay Singh said that as per House rules, any matter on which an adjournment motion had been discussed in the House could not be raised again, two hours after the discussions had begun.
Responding to this, the Leader of the Opposition, Dr Gaurishanker Shejwar said the Chief Minister had no right to quote the rules of the House, ``since he did not have any faith in democracy or the Assembly''.
This was hotly protested by some Congress members including Rakesh Choudhary, who maintained that Shejwar should not have said this.
The Speaker also ruled that the matter of Preeti's killing could not be discussed any more in the House, and this led to BJP members marching into the well of the House.
They raised slogansthere against the Government and demanded an end to atrocities on women and suspension of the Collector and the Superintendent of Surguja district.
This led to the adjournment and when the House re-assembled, the Speaker announced the formation of a committee of legislators to go into the murder of Preeti.
With this, the impasse which the House had been witnessing since February 4 came to an end and the Speaker moved on to the next item on the agenda.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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