Chandigarh, June 12
The Congress today proved that what the Haryana Chief Minister, Mr Om Prakash Chautala, says about the state’s “misfortune in having a weak Opposition” is not without substance. The party today failed to muster the minimum strength required for seeking the leave of the Assembly to move a no-confidence motion against the 15-month-old Chautala government on the last day of the two-day monsoon session.
The Congress failure becomes more glaring, considering that its motion was supported by Mr Karan Singh Dalal of the RPI and Mr Jagjit Singh Sangwan of the NCP, and the Chief Whip of the party, Mr Jai Prakash Barwala, was responsible for the loss of face by the party. A ruling party MLA commented that it was the height of non-seriousness on the part of the Congress in performing the role of a major Opposition party. Frustrated by what it called the “stonewall” attitude of the ruling party and the Speaker towards the Opposition, the Congress today gave notice of a no-confidence motion against the Chautala government. The purpose was clear. The motion would have given an ample opportunity to the Opposition MLAs to expose the government’s “failures” on various fronts.
Immediately after the House reassembled after the lunch break, the Speaker, Mr Satbir Singh Kadian, called upon the members to rise in their seats so that leave could be granted to move the motion. Besides Mr Dalal and Mr Sangwan, only 15 Congress members stood up in support of the motion. In total the number of Opposition MLAs who supported the motion was 17, one short of the mandatory 18. The HVP did not support the motion. Just as the Speaker rejected the motion, Mr Barwala trooped into the House.
The Leader of the Congress Legislature Party, Mr Bhajan Lal; the Congress President, Mr Bhupinder Singh Hooda; the Deputy Leader of the CLP, Capt Ajay Singh Yadav; and several other Congress MLAs pleaded in vain with the Speaker to re-count their members. Mr Kadian went ahead with the listed business of the House, which was adjourned sine die after the passing of an Appropriation Bill. The Congressmen were dumbfounded by this unexpected reversal. They were made to further squirm in their seats by the taunting Treasury Benches. The Parliamentary Affairs
Minister, Mr Sampat Singh, ridiculed the Congress for its poor floor management and internal groupism.
Mr Chautala too had a dig at the Congress when he said that it was his firm belief that a healthy democracy required a strong Opposition but the Congress had failed to perform its role. He told the Congressmen: “Ab aap muh dikhane ke layak nahin rahe (now you can not show your face to the people)”.
Later, Mr Bhajan Lal and Mr Hooda said their motion had been rejected by the Speaker wrongly and illegally. They claimed that Mr Barwala had entered the House before the Speaker counted the number of members supporting the motion. They said it was a well-established convention in Parliament that if a member was present in the House, his wishes had to be ascertained by the Speaker.
They claimed that the ruling party had resorted to such “cheap” tactics because it could not face the Opposition onslaught on its failure on all fronts. They also alleged that the Speaker, instead of being an impartial umpire, was playing the game of the ruling party.
Mr Bhajan Lal said if the ruling party was so confident about its majority, it should not have insisted on mere technicalities and should have allowed the motion to be debated and voted. He claimed that there was unrest among the ruling party MLAs and they could have voted in favour of the motion.
Going by the rules, this was one ruling on which Mr Kadian cannot be faulted, notwithstanding the Congress claims.
Mr Kadian said the Congress was not serious about the session from the very beginning. He said Mr Bhajan Lal had telephoned him to say that when no voting for the Rajya Sabha was to take place, what was the use of convening the session. Similar sentiments, he said, were expressed by the Congress MLA from Tosham, Mr Dharamvir Singh.
Mr Bhajan Lal, however, told TNS that he had telephoned the Speaker to protest against such a short session.
Earlier, the Assembly witnessed noisy exchanges
between the Treasury and Opposition benches and a walkout by the Congress members following the Speaker’s refusal to admit adjournment motions moved by the Congress on education and the law and order situation in the state.
The Congress members got up from their seats and some of them rushed to the well of the House demanding reasons for the non-admission of the adjournment motion. When the Speaker did not oblige them, they trooped out of the House only to return with a no-confidence motion against the government. The Speaker ruled that the motion would be taken up in the afternoon sitting with the normal business slated for the day.
There were also angry exchanges between members of the ruling party and the Opposition when Mr Bhajan Lal said that the House should have met for three days instead of two. The Congress MLAs as well as Mr Karan Singh Dalal also protested against the non-inclusion of their questions for the day. Mr Kadian’s assertions that the questions were received after the deadline failed to satisfy them. Mr Jai Parkash, Congress Chief Whip, staged a walkout from the Assembly in protest against the Speaker’s refusal to allow him to speak. Mr Kadian ordered the expunction of what the members had said without his permission.
Later, talking to presspersons in the press lounge of the Assembly building, Mr Jai Parkash alleged that he wanted to inform the House about a big land scam in Jind district. He would have asked for the government’s reaction on the issue had the Speaker allowed him to take up the matter, Mr Jai Parkash said.
