Bihar: Maheshwar Hazari elected deputy speaker amid opposition House boycott

PATNA: Four-time JD(U) MLA and former minister Maheshwar Hazari (58) was elected Deputy Speaker of Bihar Vidhan Sabha amid boycott of the House proceedings by the opposition comprising RJD, Congress, CPI-ML, CPI and CPM in protest against the use of police force against them when they were trying to block the passage of the controversial Bihar Special Armed Police Bill-2021 in the assembly on Tuesday.
RJD MLA Bhudeo Chaudhary had filed nomination papers as the opposition’s nominee for the deputy speaker post. But the opposition parties did not participate in the election process. In fact, they held their “parallel House” proceedings in the lawn of the assembly building and, “unanimously” elected Bhudeo as the deputy Speaker, who conducted the mock proceedings, seated on a chair. The opposition members narrated their woes as how the district police and auxiliary force jawans manhandled and mistreated them.
“If the government wants to run the House with the help of the police, then we will not participate in its proceedings. What happened on Tuesday was murder of democracy,” leader of the opposition Tejashwi Prasad Yadav said.
While congratulating Hazari, CM Nitish Kumar took a jibe at the opposition members, especially Tejashwi, for their opposition to the BSAP Bill in and outside the House. Without naming Tejashwi, Nitish wondered as to who all were advising him. “I don’t know as to what kind of thing some people are nursing inside them. Who all are advising him (read Tejashwi). They (opposition members) are not using the rights given to them by the rules of House business,” the CM said, adding they should have debated the Bill and moved the amendments. “What we have is democracy. They should participate in the process of the House,” he added.
Nitish said the opposition members indulged in “undemocratic” action in the House on Tuesday. “What will they gain by doing all these things?” he asked.
On Tuesday, the district police and auxiliary force jawans had bodily removed the opposition members from the assembly building for gheraoing Speaker Vijay Kumar Sinha. In the process, they were also beaten up and many of them, including women members, were injured.
Earlier, parliamentary affairs minister Vijay Kumar Choudhary requested the Speaker to elect the deputy speaker through voting. Nitish, being the member of the legislative council, did not participate in the voting and remained seated in his chair during the headcount. The six other MLCs who are ministers -- Ashok Choudhary, Janak Ram, Samrat Choudhary, Sanjay Kumar Jha, Santosh Suman and Mukesh Sahani – exited from the House during the voice vote and headcount. Three ruling party members – Shreyasi Singh, Subhash Singh and Speaker himself – could not cast their votes. Shreyasi and Subhash were out of the town and the Speaker casts his vote in case of a tie between the contesting candidates.
Hazari, who secured 124 votes in the 243-member assembly, had served as the minister of urban development and housing as well as planning and development in the previous Nitish government.
Cousin of former Union minister late Ram Vilas Paswan, Hazari also won the 2009 Lok Sabha election from Samastipur seat, defeating Ram Vilas’s brother Ram Chandra Paswan. In 2014 polls, Ram Chandra won the seat.
As the BJP has won 74 seats, the post of speaker went to them. JD(U) won just 43 seats. Hence, it was given the post of deputy speaker.
In the previous assembly constituted after the 2010 polls, when the JD(U) had won larger number of seats, the post of Speaker was given to its member Uday Narayan Choudhary and BJP MLA Amarendra Pratap Singh was elected the deputy speaker. After 2015 assembly polls, JD(U)’s Vijay Choudhary was made the Speaker though then the RJD had won larger number of seats among the three-party grand alliance.