Lok Sabha may take up opposition's notice against Speaker Om Birla on March 9

NEW DELHI: The opposition's notice for a resolution for Speaker Om Birla’s removal is likely to be taken up in Lok Sabha on the first day of the Budget session’s second part on March 9, parliamentary affairs minister Kiren Rijiju said on Sunday, as govt looks to get on with its legislative agenda in the sitting after disposing of the move against the chair.

As the BJP-led NDA has 293 members in the 542-member House and is likely to draw support of several fence-sitters, the opposition’s bid for Birla’s ouster for his alleged partiality looks set to fall through.




“On March 9 in Lok Sabha, we will have the debate on the no-confidence motion moved against the Speaker. There will be a vote following the debate,” Rijiju told TOI .

Official sources said the governing NDA is keen to deal with the issue urgently so that Birla, who has decided to not attend the House till the notice is dealt with, could return to preside over proceedings in the crucial session.

Govt’s decision to send Birla for the swearing-in ceremony of BNP leader Tarique Rahman as Bangladesh PM on Feb 17 is being seen as signalling govt’s combative support for the Speaker who attracted Congress’s wrath for saying that the party had planned to deploy its women contingent in LS to do something unprecedentedly indecorous against PM Narendra Modi during his speech on the motion of thanks to the President’s address.

The lead up to the vote will see Congress making an effort to get TMC and AAP to support the anti-Birla move. Congress is learnt to have dangled the carrot of a motion to remove chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar as a quid pro quo. TMC has been on the warpath against against the CEC over the Special Intense Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in poll-bound West Bengal.

Talking to PTI in Arunachal Pradesh, Rijiju expressed hope that Congress and other opposition parties would allow Parliament to function, but made it clear that the govt will carry on with its legislative agenda, noting that the Finance Bill will have to be passed. The Appropriation Bill will also be passed during the session.

Amid deepening acrimony between the treasury and opposition benches, govt has at times got its key bills passed amid uproar, insisting that governance cannot be allowed to be obstructed by disruptions.

BJP MP Nishikant Dubey’s notice for taking up a motion for expulsion of the leader of opposition in LS, Rahul Gandhi, is also likely to figure on the session’s agenda. If the issue is mentioned in the House, it is bound to face massive protests from opposition parties.

Rijiju termed the next part of the session interesting, noting that it coincides with the upcoming assembly elections in four states and a Union Territory — West Bengal, Assam, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Puducherry.

“We will bring some important bills, including one critical bill. We will not disclose now as to what the bill is, but we will bring up one very important business in the second part. We will pass all these bills,” he said.
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