The Hindu : Speaker election on May 10

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, May 04, 2002

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National

Speaker election on May 10

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI MAY 3. The Lok Sabha will elect its Speaker on May 10 and in all likelihood the BJP will have its own man in the position in the absence of any enthusiasm on the part of the Telugu Desam Party to retain the post.

The position of presiding officer of the Lok Sabha fell vacant in March last when G.M.C. Balayogi, TDP nominee, was killed in an aircrash. Since then, the Government has been waiting to hear from the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and TDP leader, Chandrababu Naidu, to select its nominee. Even now the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, can be expected to sound Mr. Naidu before selecting the BJP's man.

However, for some time now, ever since the Gujarat violence, especially after Mr. Naidu's demand that the Gujarat Chief Minister, Narendra Modi, be removed met with a rebuff from the BJP, the TDP has been trying to distance itself from the Vajpayee Government although the relationship is far from having reached the breaking point. After the TDP's decision on April 30 not to cast its vote in favour of the Government on the censure motion on Gujarat in Parliament, it is almost a foregone conclusion that the TDP will not seek the Speaker's post.

The BJP would like to believe that Mr. Naidu is having difficulty in choosing a man for the position from among the several claimants in its legislature party, but that view has few takers because Mr. Naidu hardly consulted the legislature party when nominating Balayogi in 1999.

The Parliamentary Affairs Minister, Pramod Mahajan, met Mr. Vajpayee, this morning and suggested that the Speaker be elected on May 10, ahead of the golden jubilee of Parliament on May 13.

Mr. Vajpayee has set the ball rolling by sending off a letter to the Secretary-General of the Lok Sabha, who, in turn, will get the approval from the President.

The election will then be notified.

Exactly 50 years ago, on May 13, 1952 the newly-elected members of the first Lok Sabha were sworn-in as Members of Parliament.

The Government is planning a small function to commemorate that event — possibly a stamp will be released — and it is felt that a duly-elected Speaker must be in place by that date.

Although some names are doing the rounds — Cabinet Ministers, Jagmohan and Ram Naik and the BJP spokesperson, V.K.Malhotra — it seems that no serious thought has as yet been given by the Government on who its choice should be. What seems certain is that the BJP is in no mood to offer the position to one of its allies as they all have Cabinet positions.

The TDP was accommodated because it was giving outside support to the Government and had no presence in the Government.

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