Stormy start to UP budget session: Paper balls thrown at Governor

Uttar Pradesh budget session began on a stormy note on Thursday with opposition members throwing paper balls at governor Ram Naik during his address at the session.

The customary address of the governor to the joint sitting of the two Houses of the state legislature was drowned in the uproar created by the opposition.

For nearly two decades, it has become a practice for the opposition to disrupt the governor's customary address.

Last year, in the first session of the present Assembly, the opposition Samajwadi Party had obstructed the Governor's address by raising slogans and throwing paper balls at the podium.

In view of the opposition's protest during the governor's address at the Assembly's first session last year, Speaker H N Dixit had recently warned the MLAs of disciplinary action if they carry out "planned obstructions" during the address.

This will be the Yogi Adityanath government's second budget which is likely to focus on measures to ensure a spurt in economic activities besides providing respite to farmers in distress.

This will be the Yogi Adityanath government's second budget which is likely to focus on measures to ensure a spurt in economic activities besides providing respite to farmers in distress.

The budget will be keenly watched by financial as well as political experts as it will reveal the roadmap of development in the state during the financial year 2018-19.

Hitting out at the government, Samajwadi Party spokesman Sunil Singh Sajan said, "No businessman will invest in a state, where there is a problem of law and order. A state whose capital is unsafe, and a state where even the police is not safe, how the business community can feel that they will be safe?"

Sajan, an MLC, also condemned the recent statement of UP MSME minister Satyadev Pachauri that the Kasganj violence was "minor incident".

He said, "The UP government is on backfoot (on Kasganj violence), and it is calling the violence as minor incident. Are they waiting for any major communal violence in the state?"

SP leaders are chalking out a plan to seek answers from the government over different issues including the "dismal law and order situation and a sense of insecurity among women", he said.

OneIndia News