Hold Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker poll, Congress writes to Om Birla

Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 9

As part of Parliament session strategy, the Congress today wrote to the Lok Sabha Speaker asking for election to the vacant post of Deputy Speaker and former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh advised the party to seek a white paper on major issues, mainly the India-China standoff along the Line of Actual Control in Ladakh.

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Singh put forth his views to Congress president Sonia Gandhi and said the party must ask the government for a white paper on the “LAC issue, Covid-19 status and rising unemployment”. The Congress plans to raise these issues vociferously in the session starting September 14.

Congress leader in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury wrote to Speaker Om Birla demanding election for the post of Deputy Speaker. “The Rajya Sabha is on the verge of electing Deputy Chairman. It is an opportune moment to elect the Deputy Speaker of the lower house. I would urge upon you that during monsoon season itself, the Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker must be elected,” he wrote.

Citing past convention of the Deputy Speaker’s post going to the Opposition, the Congress leader said, “According to constitutional mandate, the post should be filled either by election or consensus as early as possible after new Lok Sabha is constituted.”

Adir said a year had elapsed since the 17th Lok Sabha was constituted, but there was no Deputy Speaker. The BJP has 303 MPs in the Lok Sabha and the Congress has 51.

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