Bhubaneswar: The short monsoon session of the State Assembly promises to be stormy as Opposition BJP and the Congress have lined up many issues including Covid mismanagement to attack the government. The ruling party is prepared to counter the Opposition and aims to pass 16 bills.
The eight-day session will start at 11 am September 29 and continue till October 7. The legislature party meeting of the BJD, BJP and Congress Monday chalked out the strategy for the monsoon session. Leader of Opposition Pradipta Naik said his party will raise issues including Covid mismanagement, university amendment bill, power tariff hike and floods.
Similarly, the Congress has planned to target both the BJD and the BJP over the farm bills. “Both the governments at the Centre and the state don’t know what their power is in the new law. They bring new laws to kill the farmers,” senior Congress legislator Narasingha Mishra said. The Congress party will also raise some other issues related to Covid management, flood, university bill, power tariff hike and CBI raids on chit fund scam, said Congress MLA Taraprasad Bahinipati. The ruling BJD is all set to give befitting replies to the Opposition in the floor of the house. “We are always open to constructive suggestions and criticisms of the opposition friends,” Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik said.
“With the support of people of Odisha and dedicated hard work of Covid warriors, Odisha is putting a brave fight against Covid. We have one of the highest recovery rates in the country and Odisha saves maximum people in the country with low fatality rates,” Naveen said.
The 16 bills scheduled to be passed included the Epidemic Diseases Bill, the Odisha Agriculture Produce & Livestock Contract Farming & Service (Promotion & Facilitation) Bill, the Odisha Agriculture Produce & Livestock Marketing (Promotion & Facilitation) Bill and the Odisha University (Amendment) Bill.