Ahmedabad:
Gujarat Assembly Speaker Ganpat Vasava has given clean chit to two BJP MLAs who were accused by a local journalist of looking at obscene photos in the state Assembly on an iPad. The Speaker said that a forensic team found nothing objectionable in the iPad.
Emboldened by the Speaker's verdict, the BJP has said it will demand an apology from the Congress tomorrow.
Journalist Janakbhai Purohit, working with a local newspaper Gujarat Samachar, released a video clip - captured on a cellphone by another journalist - purportedly showing the two MLAs, Shankar Chowdhary and Jetha Bhai Dharwad, looking at obscene photos of women on an iPad while sitting in the House.
"First they started by watching the pictures of Swami Vivekananda, then cartoons and then pics of women... I saw them watching some sleazy photographs of women and felt it was wrong... I went to the Speaker's chamber and complained about it to his Personal Assistant that it was a repeat of Karnataka; he informed the Speaker and the viewing was stopped," the journalist said. "This went on for about 20 minutes...they were engrossed in watching the vulgar pictures," he added.
The Speaker had ordered an investigation by a special empowered committee of the Gujarat Assembly. He also ordered MLA Shankar Chowdhary to deposit his iPad with his special secretary.
Mr Chowdhary had denied that any such incident happened. "This has no basis... no such incident happened... somebody is trying to defame me," the BJP MLA had said. Mr Dharwad, who allegedly viewed porn along with Mr Chowdhary, said, "We will resign if found guilty."
The Congress lashed out at the BJP saying it exposes "the real face of the Narendra Modi government."
Earlier this year, three ministers in the Karnataka Assembly, where the BJP is in power, were accused of watching porn on a cellphone. The ministers were forced to resign. A committee set up there by the Speaker of the House has concluded that there was evidence to indict one of them.