‘Mani play’ for government survival

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:  The UDF Government’s survival during the division on the Appropriation Bill on July 20 was ensured by Finance Minister K M Mani​ who prolonged his speech to enable all the UDF members present  to participate in the voting.

This was revealed by the video footages of the voting which were screened before the Speaker, Chief Minister Oommen Chandy​, representatives of UDF partners and media in the Assembly here on Wednesday. The screening disproved the allegation of the Opposition that there was bogus voting by one member of the ruling front.

Opposition members boycotted the screening alleging that because of the delay in examining the clippings, there was a chance for manipulating the clippings.

After viewing the video clippings,  Oommen Chandy told reporters that the Opposition had deliberately run away from the examination after raising unnecessary controversies. ‘’Opposition Leader V S Achuthanandan should apologise to the people  for creating an unnecessary controversy that created doubts about the credibility of the Assembly,’’ he said.

Of the 69 members of the UDF who voted in support of the Appropriation Bill, C P  Mohammed and T A  Ahmed Kabir​, raised their hands to vote as the button before them did not work.

K K  Jayachandran (LDF)  pressed the abstain button. Other members of the LDF did not take part in the voting. T U Kuruvilla, Hibi Eden and Varkala Kahar from the  UDF were not present.

As per the clippings, K M  Mani had wound up his speech and resumed his seat and Speaker G  Karthikeyan had announced the proceedings for voting. This was when the Opposition members started to raise the issue of delay in voting.

Voting took place eight minutes after the voting proceeding had begun.

The clippings also revealed C F Thomas​ asking K M  Mani to prolong his speech. Industries Minister P K  Kunhalikutty is heard asking the ‘Finance Minister to provoke them’.