Maharashtra budget leaked on Twitter, claims Oppn

Amidst sloganeering and protests the Congress-NCP-led Opposition staged a walkout from the Maharashtra legislature, alleging that the budget has been leaked on Twitter.

However, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, finance and planning minister Sudhir Mungantiwar denied this and said that the Opposition was disheartened and are making baseless allegations.

Leaders of Congress and the NCP demanded that Fadnavis and Mungantiwar tender an apology.

The Opposition benches are also contemplating bringing in a breach of privilege motion against the finance minister, saying that leaking of the budget was serious.

While Mungantiwar tabled the budget in the Assembly, minister of state for finance and planning Deepak Kesarkar tabled the budget in Council.

"I have personally checked when the issue was raised. The budget has not been leaked. Highlights were posted on Twitter only after the minister spoke on that point," Fadnavis said.

Speaker Haribhau Bagade asked the Opposition to remain calm and not boycott the proceedings. The former chief minister and veteran Congress leader Prithviraj Chavan said that in such a case in any other country, the concerned minister would have resigned.

Congress leader in Assembly, Vijay Wadettiwar said that the chief minister was trying to protect the minister. "It is an insult to the legislators," said Wadettiwar, whose name has been proposed for the post of leader of Opposition in Assembly.

"We were in power for 15 years, but the budget never got leaked. Now the budget provisions were being put out on the finance minister's Twitter account along with advertisement even before he read out those to us," NCP MLA and former deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar said.

When Kesarkar rose to present the budget in the Upper House, leader of Opposition Dhananjay Munde waved his mobile phone and said budget details were there online.

Following a ruckus over the issue, Council Chairman Ramraje Naik-Nimbalkar adjourned the House for 10 minutes.