The Opposition Congress on Tuesday boycotted the special session of Madhya Pradesh Assembly which has been called to discuss development in the state.

Along with the Congress, the BSP is also boycotting the four-day long session which has been convened specifically to discuss the idea of turning Madhya Pradesh into a Golden State.

Congress members, led by Deputy Leader of the Congress Legislature Party, Choudhry Rakesh Singh Chaturvedi and including senior MLAs Ajay Singh, Govind Singh, Arif Aqeel, Tulsi Silavat others walked into the Assembly premises in a procession and paid floral tributes at the bust of Mahatma Gandhi at the entrance.

Later, they staged a sit-in on the Assembly stairs where they raised slogans against the BJP government led by Chief Minister, Shivraj Singh Chouhan.

Ajay told reporters on the occasion that they have boycotted the session as it was "unconstitutional".

"It cannot be termed as a Special Session as such a session can be called only during emergency situations like drought, war or any other natural calamity and not just to discuss development," he said.

"For discussing the issue of development the same government had a full five-year term during its earlier regime and even during the sessions held earlier including the just concluded Budget session development of the state was one of the major issues that we have discussed," Ajay said.

"The Congress is not against development, but the procedure adopted by the government is unconstitutional," he said.

Ajay said that though Chouhan has written a letter to the Congress President, Sonia Gandhi with a request to direct her party MLAs to attend the session, he failed to ensure the full strength of his party MLAs and Ministers on such an important occasion.

A total of 68 Congress MLAs, out of the total 69, were present on the occasion, senior Congress leader N P Prajapati said.

BSP members have also boycotted Special Session by staging a separate sit-in in front of the entry gate of the Assembly.

Party leader, Ramlakhan Singh told reporters that they have boycotted the session as the government earlier had agreed to discuss the issues of law and order problem, corruption, power and drinking water crisis on a particular day during the four-day long session, but the same was missing from the house agenda distributed before the session.