Odisha Assembly adjourned sine die with 12 days left

Odisha Sun Times Bureau
Bhubaneswar, Dec 5:

The winter session of the Odisha Assembly came to an abrupt end with the House passing a resolution to adjourn it sine die well ahead of schedule.

The motion moved by the government chief whip Ananta Das was passed amid boycott by the entire Opposition.

Originally scheduled to end on Dececmber 20, the House was adjourned 14 days ahead of the scheduled closure with 12 working days left. The Assembly sat for just 14 out of the 26 days originally scehduled.

The winter session ended on th same note it had begun on Novemebr 20 with ruckus, slogan shouting, banner waving marking the proceedings on all 14 days that it met.

Amid the pandemonium, however, eight Bills, apart from the Appropritaion Bill approving the supplementary budget, were passed during the truncated session.

The House, it may be noted, has approved a motion yesterday waiving the mandatory requirement of 60 sittings a day – again amid vociferous Opposition protest.

The Opposition predictably cried foul after the abrupt adjournmen tof the House accusing the ruling party of running away from a debate on the chit fund scam.

“The sole puprpose of the premature adjournment of the House was to wriggle out of a debate on the chit fund scam, which would have exposed the entire government and the Chief Minister,” Leader of Opposition Narasingha Mishra said.

But the government defended the move. “It is a pity that the Opposition continuously disturbed the proceedings of the House when a number of important issues related to the welfare of the House,” Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik said.

Basanta Panda, leader of the BJP Lgislature Party said it was a reflection of the ‘dictatorship’ that has marked the BJD’s 14-year rule. “They are only  intersted in passing legislation that would benefit them and not in the welfare of the people,” he said.

Earlier, the the House was adjourned for the second time in the day as pandemonium prevailed even after it reassembled at 3 PM today.

When the House reassembled at 3 PM to resume business after the first adjournment earlier in the day, Leader of the Opposition Narasingha Mishra rose from his seat and said that voice of the Opposition was being deliberately muzzled.

He said it was because of the brute majority of the ruling party that their voice has been stifled. Congress members then staged a noisy walkout and sat on a dharna in front of the statue of Mahatma Gandhi to lodge their protest.

The speaker asked government chief whip Ananta Das to get the Congress members back to the House. But the Congressmembers were in no mood to oblige.

Soon after the Congress members left the House, BJP members rushed into the well of the House with tufts of paddy in their hands raising the issue of distress sale of paddy by the farmers in western Odisha and demanding a discussion on the issue.

BJP members placed some tufts of paddy on the podium of the speaker.

As noisy scenes prevailed in the House the speaker adjourned the House till 5 PM.