Though no confidence motion against Speaker OM Birla got defeated , the opposition got an opportunity to raise the point of his partisan behaviour
Finally the no confidence motion against the speaker OM Birla submitted by the vociferous Indian National Developlental Inclusuve Alliance constituents’ MPs as expected was defeated in Lok Sabha.
Though there was quite a hectic debate and acrimonious scenes during the discussion on the no confidence motion which was defeated but the opposition at least got an opportunity to gain the attention of the countrymen to raise their concern as to how Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi was always specifically targetted by the ruling party and the Speaker OM Birla and how the latter is playing an alleged partisan role despite being a speaker who is constutionally an impartial non partisan chief in the Lok Sabha, elected by the millions of electorates of the country.
According to the opposition, this is for the first time that the speaker of Lok Sabha is behaving in an absolute partisan manner as the agent of the ruling political dispensation and not as the constitutional head of the lower house.
While the house witnessed the acrimonious scenes from the treasury and opposition benches , the home minister Amit Shah was on his heals using his full throat power to ridicule Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi reminding the house as to how he tried to create rukus in the house by blinking his eyes, going to the prime minister and embracing him even giving flying kiss etc.
To this the entire opposition, especially the Congress MPs got up shouting on Amit Shah and treasury benches that he has used the unparliamentary language against the Leader of the opposition.
This resulted in the hectic acrimonious scenes from both the opposition and treasury benches leading to the voice voting on the no confidence motion.
Though it was crystal clear from the beginning that the no confidence motion would fall but it did give an opportunity to the opposition to raise their point of partisan attitude ( pro government) being adopted by the speaker who is cunstititionally supposed to be non partisan and honest as earlier several speakers especially like Somnath Chatterjee who even rejected the intervention of the Supreme Court in Parliamentary proceedings saying that the apex court has no right to intervene as Parliament is supreme.
During the voice vote the opposition was already having less votes than the ruling parties . The INDIA opposition has only 238 votes comprising of 99 MPs of Congress and rest of the Samajwadi Party, Trinamool Congress, Left parties, and other regional ones. On the other hand the BJP led NDA had the support of 293 MPs which included 240 MPs of BJP singularly, 16 of JDU, 12 of TDP and other NDA parties.
Now the question arises as to why did the the opposition despite knowing that they will lose the no confidence motion come forth with it.
This was because the present speaker according to the opposition parties been unambiguously partial and favouring the ruling party and acting against the LOP Rahul Gandhi and opposition parties not allowing them to speak in the parliament and even expelling them from the house.
The incident of LOP Rahul Gandhi raising the voice on former General Narvane’s book in the Lok Sabha is well known to one and all when he was not allowed to raise the issue and finally suspended from the house.
Several member of parliament were suspended for the whole session for raising issues of national significance that criticized the government.
The opposition had also raised the issue of women gheraoing the PM ‘s seat, though he was not on the seat. The BJP accused the women MP’s of posing threat to the PM then.
While commencing his speech the Congress MP Tarun Gogoi had said that this motion had been brought because the speaker of the Lok Sabha has given up mataining the impartial attitude towards the members of all political parties and adopting a partisan attitude.
He catagorically said that the speaker clearly behaves in a partisan manner and violates the constitutional rights of the opposition MPs including pronounces decisions that weakens the opposition rights to speak and raise issues.
He even said that the speaker openly favours the ruling party on controvertial matters than arriving at a judicious decisions.
The union Home minister responded to the accusations of the Congress saying that when the speaker was elected everyone supported him. He said that the opposition is falsely trying to show ethics but the fact is that their behaviour has elicited this response from the speaker. He said the speaker’s decision is final though one can have differences with him. He said even today the security of the speaker is at stake when he is in his chamber. The opposition MPs strongly objected to this and came in the well of the house.
