Bhubaneswar: A man carrying his sister’s skeleton to a bank in Keonjhar caused an uproar during the special session of the Odisha Assembly convened Thursday to discuss “Participation of Women in Indian Democracy”, with Congress MLAs walking out of the chamber briefly in protest.
As soon as the day-long session began, Congress members rushed to the well of the House, holding placards and criticising the BJP-led state government over the incident, even as Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi tried to set the tone of the debate by accusing the opposition of derailing the tweaked women’s quota bill and delimitation bill in the Lok Sabha.
Even as Congress MLAs raised slogans over the skeleton episode, House Speaker Surama Padhy allowed the proceedings to continue, leading to the opposition party’s legislators staging a walkout briefly.
Initiating the discussion on the topic of the special session, Chief Minister Majhi targeted the BJD’s 24-year rule in Odisha to say,
“The BJD reserving 33 per cent seats for women in the panchayati raj system was not sufficient. They should have made provision to give women adequate representation in the Lok Sabha and in the Assembly too.”
“BJD made a provision for 33 per cent women’s representation at the panchayat level but did not allow it in the Assembly and in the Lok Sabha,” he said.
Hitting back, Leader of Opposition Naveen Patnaik referred to the Keonjhar incident to say the “insensitive” state government has “utterly failed the people of Odisha”.
Terming the tribal man’s ordeal “painful”, he said, “Odisha’s head hangs in shame as a woman’s skeleton had to be exhumed by her family and carried to the bank to prove her death in order to claim her rightful dues.”
Taking potshots at the “double engine government in the state”, Patnaik said, “Such inhumane governance has never been witnessed in the history of Odisha.”
Lambasting the state government, the BJD president said, “The BJP government in Odisha has no right to speak of women’s dignity and empowerment. Governance has been reduced to narratives and optics. The chief minister should do some soul-searching before making any more statements.”
About the Constitution amendment bill that got derailed in the Lok Sabha recently, Patnaik clarified that the bill on women’s reservation in legislatures was passed unanimously in Parliament in 2023.
“The BJD had supported this bill in Parliament, and even today we demand that it be implemented immediately,” Patnaik said.
He said that his BJD had fielded women in 33 per cent of the Lok Sabha seats in the state in 2019 and 2024. “Can the BJP claim the same? Apart from paying lip service to women’s rights and creating false narratives to fool the public, what did it do? People cannot be fooled all the time.”
The BJD had all along empowered women in Odisha, he said, adding that under Biju Patnaik, “Odisha was one of the first states to implement 33 per cent reservation for women in all local bodies in Odisha.”
“In 2011, my government increased it to 50 per cent,” the former chief minister said.
He alleged that linking the women’s reservation bill, which was already passed in Parliament in 2023, to the delimitation bill was a “clandestine” attempt at pushing through delimitation.
Stating that BJD was against the delimitation bill because it seeks to reduce the political rights of Odisha, Patnaik said, “History will not forgive us if we support this delimitation bill.”
Deputy Chief Minister Pravati Parida targeted Patnaik by referring to Dana Majhi, a tribal man in Kalahandi, who walked 10 kilometres carrying his wife’s corpse on his shoulder a decade ago under the BJD’s rule.
“Odisha was condemned in the Dana Majhi incident. What was Naveen Babu doing then? Today, he is shedding crocodile tears,” she said.
Congress Legislature Party leader Rama Chandra Kadam also raised the Keonjhar incident and said, “A poor tribal man was forced to dig out his sister’s skeleton to give proof of her death. This government has not implemented the PESA Rules to protect the rights of tribals.”
“The Congress has all along fought for the safety and protection of women. We always stand for the rights of women,” Kadam said.
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