PDP legislator apologises for slapping marshal

A Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) legislator who slapped a Jammu and Kashmir assembly marshal Wednesday apologised in the house Thursday.

Syed Bashir, who represents the south Kashmir Rajpura constituency, said in the assembly that he did not intend to insult or injure any official of the state assembly.

"What happened was totally unintended and momentary. If somebody's sentiment have been hurt by my action, or if the dignity of the august house was undermined by my unintentional action, I tender my apology," Syed Bashir said.

PDP legislators raised a hue and cry in the assembly Wednesday, alleging that the state government was trying to protect a former minister against whom a First Information Report has been lodged in Srinagar for sexual assault on a woman doctor.

Speaker Mubarak Gul had ordered the assembly marshals to remove PDP legislator Syed Bashir, who was shouting, for disrupting the proceedings of the house. While the marshals were physically removing him, Bashir slapped one of them, creating an ugly scene in the house.

Hitting out at Congress spokesperson Salman Soz, who had said that Afzal Guru's body must be returned to his family, PDP president Mehboooba Mufti said the demand is politically motivated. Salman Soz is son of the party's state unit president Saif-ud-din Soz.

"This is clearly a vote bank politics. When everybody was agitating for the return of Afzal Guru's body, the Congress kept quiet and now when the elections are drawing close, they support the return of his body," the PDP president said.