Bhubaneswar: Perhaps for the first time in the history of Odisha Assembly, Speaker Surya Narayan Patro Tuesday expressed his regret at his decision to adjourn the House Monday when Leader of Opposition Pradipta Kumar Naik was speaking on the mysterious death of panchayat executive officer of Jajpur, Smitarani Biswal. The Speaker’s action to adjourn the House had irked the opposition BJP members.
“I could not understand what the Leader of Opposition was saying yesterday. I feel sorry for that. I had no intention to debar him from speaking in the House,” Patro said at the beginning of the Zero Hour this morning.
While opposition BJP welcomed the Speaker’s gesture, the treasury bench members were surprised and raised question as to how the speaker can tender apology.
Patro, however, said “A mistake is a mistake. If anyone commits mistake, there should not be any hesitation in saying ‘sorry’.”
Naik, the leader of opposition, said: “We welcome the gesture of the Speaker. It is his duty to protect rights of the members, particularly those belonging to opposition parties.”
With Patro saying “sorry,” the acrimony between the opposition BJP and the speaker ended on a sweet note and the saffron party leaders actively participated in the business of the House after five days of agitation over the issue.
During past five days, the BJP members had trooped into the well of the House with their faces covered with black scarves, staged dharna near Mahatma Gandhi statue on the Assembly premises and rushed to Raj Bhawan while demanding a CBI probe into Smitarani’s death.
The saffron party has been claiming that she was raped and subsequently killed and the state government was trying to cover up the matter as ruling party members were involved in the crime.
Though Naik hailed the Speaker’s gesture, he did not spare ruling BJD and the state government.
Quoting former Prime Minister AB Vajpayee, Naik said: “You may run the government with absolute majority, but you cannot run the House by ignoring the opposition.”
Naik said Vajpayee had said this when the saffron party had only two members in the Lok Sabha. “The then Lok Sabha speaker Balaram Jhakar had denied Vajpayeeji to speak in the House because BJP had only two members,” Naik said.
“Today, the situation has changed and BJP has absolute majority. Who knows, one day the ruling BJD will also face the fate of Congress in Odisha,” said Naik.
The BJP leader also cited the instance of former Lok Sabha speaker Somnath Chatterjee who stood by the principles and preferred to annoy his own party.
“After becoming speaker, one should always remain above politics and consider all members on equal terms,” he said.
Stating that he is the youngest leader of opposition in the history of Odisha Assembly, Naik said: “This Assembly has seen many illustrious Speakers including Nilakantha Das, Lingaraj Panigrahi, Nanda Kishore Mishra, Brajamohan Mohanty and many others. We should follow the great personalities,” he added.
Naik reiterated BJP’s demand for CBI probe into Smitarani’s death, action against Jajpur SP for allegedly assassinating character of the deceased woman, removal of state Commission of Women chairperson and registration of case under section 302 (murder) of IPC instead of 306 (abetment).