The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLAs in Telangana on Saturday boycotted the oath ceremony organised for new elected legislators in protest against the appointment of “anti-Hindu” Pro-Tem Speaker.
The Telangana Assembly has appointed AIMIM’s Akbaruddin Owaisi as the Pro-tem speaker, who is tasked with administering oath to the newly elected MLAs.
Goshamahal BJP MLA T Raja Singh said that he would never take oath in front of the AIMIM.
“Can I take oath in front of a person (Akbaruddin Owaisi) who made anti-Hindu comments in the past,” he said in a video statement, adding that he will take oath only when a full-time Speaker is appointed.
The BJP had won eight seats in recently held Telangana Assembly Elections.
Reacting to the row, Telangana BJP chief G Kishan Reddy said that they are against the appointment of Owaisi, claiming it was against the tradition of appointing senior most MLA as Pro-tem Speaker.
“BJP MLAs will boycott taking oath before this Protem Speaker. Our MLAs will take oath after a Speaker is appointed. We will never ally with such a party (AIMIM). We will go to the Governor on this,” he told reporters.
This is not the first time the BJP leaders has refused to be administered oath by the Pro-tem Speaker. He had refused to take oath in 2018 as the Pro-tem speaker was from the AIMIM.
As the controversy erupted, the Congress accused the BJP MLAs of creating confusion and said that the decision to appoint Owaisi as Pro-tem Speaker was taken by the Governor of Telangana.
“The BJP MLAs are creating confusion. The decision to make Akbaruddin Owaisi the pro-tem Speaker is of the Governor of Telangana. What we always said has finally been proven. AIMIM is the B team of BJP,” Congress spokesperson Supriya Shrinate said.
Congress leader Uttam Reddy said that being the senior most he should have been made the Pro-tem Speaker but this could not happen since he took oath as the minister.
“Akbaruddin is the next senior-most. We did what was the right thing to do,” he added.