Tripura CM Manik Sarkar says Kerala Assembly violence undemocratic, blames government

TEZPUR: Terming the violence inside the Kerala Assembly as "unfortunate and undemocratic", Tripura Chief Minister Manik Sarkar today defended opposition LDF MLAs and blamed the state government for the incident.

"The entire incident was unfortunate and undemocratic. In a democratic country like India, this should not have happened at all," said Sarkar, who is also the Polit Bureau member of CPI(M), an LDF constituent.

He, however, said the entire fault was of the ruling party and the failure of the government to manage the house.

"It's total fault of the ruling party. The government failed to manage the state as well as the Assembly. The Budget presented by the Finance Minister was also completely wrong," Sarkar said.

"The people of whole Kerala are witnessing this. They know what is the truth. They will judge it," he said at a press conference here.

Meanwhile, the Kerala Assembly today suspended five CPI (M)-led Left Democratic Front opposition MLAs till the end of the session for allegedly ransacking the Speaker's podium on the Budget Day on March 13 when their protest against Finance Minister K M Mani, facing corruption charges, turned violent.

The suspended MLAs are E P Jayarajan, V Sivankutty, K Kunjahmed (all CPI-M), K T Jaleel (LDF-IND) and K Ajit (CPI).

Sarkar is in Tezpur to attend the CPI(M) Assam state conference.