NEW DELHI: The suspended Congress MLAs, who were staging a sit-in protest in the Well of the House against the action taken against them, were forcibly removed from the Assembly and dropped near Congress Bhawan, a party leader alleged on Wednesday.
The legislators were compelled to spend Tuesday night on the street at Master Canteen after their removal from the Assembly.
“We were manhandled and forcibly evicted from the Assembly at the dead of the night. This is grossly illegal and undemocratic,” stated party MLA Taraprasad Bahinipati, one of two Congress MLAs not under suspension.

On Wednesday, Odisha Congress president Bhakta Charan Das and AICC in-charge of Odisha, Ajay Kumar Lallu, initiated a dharna at Master Canteen area to protest the suspension of 12 party MLAs.
Congress Legislature Party (CLP) leader Rama Chandra Kadam stated that the MLAs were deprived of basic necessities including food, water and toilet facilities during their Assembly stay. Kadam suffered an injury to his finger when a security personnel closed a door on his hand on Tuesday night.
The Congress legislators received a seven-day suspension from the House on Tuesday for ‘indiscipline’. They had requested the formation of a House Committee to investigate the increase in crimes against women across the state following BJP’s rise to power in June last year.

The suspension incident led to confrontations outside the Assembly on Tuesday night, with police blocking senior Congress leaders from entering the premises. The leaders were subsequently transported to reserve ground and released.
Bhubaneswar DCP Jagmohan Meena confirmed that Congress leaders and supporters were taken into preventive custody and later released at the reserve ground.
Taking to X, Congress Odisha in-charge Ajay Kumar Lallu said: “The Congress party is fighting from the streets to the House for investigation of the exploitation and atrocities on women in Odisha. Our 12 MLAs were expelled from the House, and now when state president Bhakta Charan Das Ji and former state president Jaydev Jena Ji were going to meet the MLAs sitting on strike in the Assembly, the police forcibly arrested them. Why is the government afraid of a high-level investigation? What does it want to hide by not forming an investigation committee?”
Suspended Congress MLA Sofia Firdous on Wednesday said: “Let this be clear-suspension and intimidation cannot stop us. We will continue our fight, inside and outside the Assembly, until every woman in Odisha feels safe and justice is served.”