Haritha issue raised in Assembly session; Oppn disapproves of same

The first day of the Kerala assembly's third session on Monday saw the UDF-led opposition expressing disapproval towards a question pertaining to dissolution of the state committee of Haritha, IUML's women student wing, saying the query was raised with ''wrong intentions'' and ought to be rejected outright.

Leader of the Opposition in the assembly, V D Satheesan, said question hour was meant for raising issues which are in general public interest and should not be used to level political accusations.

Satheesan said that the Speaker had earlier given an assurance that such questions which pertain to internal functioning of a political party should not be raised in the assembly.

He also said the question was not supposed to be raised as per the assembly's rules of procedure as it pertained to the internal functioning of a political party and therefore, such queries ought to be barred by the Speaker.

The query was -- what the state government was doing to change the mindset of the people in view of the action taken by the leadership of a prominent political party against some of its women members for complaining against alleged inappropriate comments made regarding them.

Responding to Satheesan's comments, Speaker M B Rajesh said the issue raised by him was serious as there was a past ruling that this should not happen.

However, the instant question was edited and was put up for comments since September 25 and no complaints were made against the same, which was why it was listed, he said.

To this, Satheesan sought to know that once there has been a ruling by the Speaker and a question like this was raised despite that, what steps were taken against the legislature secretariat for allowing such queries.

''This question was in violation of the Speaker's ruling and that is what we wanted to bring to your attention,'' he said.

However, right after that, Alappuzha MLA P P Chitharanjan again raised the issue, saying those who made anti-women and sexually coloured remarks were protected and the women who complained against the same were punished.

He said strict action ought to be taken to ensure that women in the political arena can function without any harassment.

To this, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said ''there are still remnants of anti-women thinking in our society and we all need to work towards ensuring gender equality and safety for women.'' He said that common women folk and their problems should be the primary concern of the government as women in the political arena are well equipped and capable of handling the problems they face.

The CM said that as regards problems faced by women in politics are concerned, their respective political parties have to look into it and take appropriate steps, ''which I think they are doing''.

To Vamanapuram MLA D K Murali's query on whether the involvement of any prominent political party or senior political leader was found in relation to the complaint of sexual harassment made by a member of Haritha to the women's commission and police, the CM said he has no details of the same.

The Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) last month had dissolved the state committee of Haritha after it rejected the high command's demand to withdraw the complaint a group of its members had filed with the Kerala Women's Commission, seeking action against some male leaders of Muslim Students Federation, who allegedly used derogatory remarks against them.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)