Numbers may fluctuate slightly after scrutiny
*Private Bills, Resolutions too submitted by MLAs
Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, Jan 20: A record 1500 plus questions have been received by the Legislative Assembly from the MLAs for 22-day long budget session of the Legislature beginning February 2.
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“The number could go up as some questions received online and others by-hand are being clubbed and scrutinized by the Assembly staff for forwarding them to concerned departments for their replies,” officials told the Excelsior.
However, they said, number of the Private Members’ Bills and Resolutions received by the Assembly Secretariat will be known in a couple of days as priority of the Legislature staff is questions which have to be listed from Day 2 i.e. February 3. However, the Private Bills and Resolutions will be taken up in second part of the budget session which will resume on March 27.
In the House of 90, 83 MLAs are entitled to ask 20 questions-10 each in starred and un-starred categories. Besides Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, there are five Ministers and a Speaker. Rest 83 legislators are eligible for submitting the questions for which the Assembly Secretariat had fixed January 12 as the last date.
“If every legislator submits 20 questions, the total numbers will come out at 1660,” the officials said, adding this time the number of questions is almost close to touching 1600.
The starred questions are taken up during Question Hour with concerned Minister’s reply followed by supplementaries by the MLAs. However, the legislators are given only written replies for un-starred questions.
“Since the questions related to Home Department including terrorism and law and order issues can’t be asked by the legislators as Jammu and Kashmir is now a Union Territory and Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha holds charge of the Home Department, the focus of MLAs remained on Health, Education, Rural Development, Revenue, Finance and Industry related issues,” the officials said but added that questions have been received pertaining to almost all the departments.
Unless the Question Hour isn’t disrupted by the MLAs, nearly 10-12 questions are taken up in a day. The session has 22 working days but the Question Hour is not held on the day of the Lieutenant Governor’s Address. Nearly 200 questions can be discussed during the session if there are no disruptions.
The budget session will have 22 sittings-15 in first half and seven in second half. The first half is scheduled from February 2-19 and second part from March 27-April 4.
Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, who also holds charge of the Finance Department, will present annual budget for the financial year of 2026-27 on February 6. This will be his second budget. He had presented the budget for ongoing financial year of 2025-26 on March 7 2025.
Besides 20 questions each, the MLAs are entitled to submit two Private Members Bills and four Private Members Resolutions. The deadline for submitting questions was January 12 while it was January 15 for bills and January 17 for Resolutions.
Current financial year’s budget (2025-26) presented by Omar in the Assembly on March 7, 2025 was to the tune of Rs 1,12,310 crore, down from 1,18, 728 crore of 2024-25. In 2023-24, J&K’s budget was worth Rs 1,18,500 crore.
The Chief Minister is also expected to table pre-budget Economic Survey Reports in the Assembly a day before presentation of annual budget.
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