Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Feb 13: Eight Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) have not submitted even a single question for 34 days budget session of the Legislature beginning February 28 and some of them included dropped Ministers of ruling National Conference and a couple of senior opposition leaders.
Nearly 30 MLAs from both ruling and opposition parties haven’t submitted a single Private Member’s Bill or Resolution.
Official sources told the Excelsior that out of 61 MLAs in the House of 89, who were eligible for submitting 20 questions (10 each in starred and un-starred categories), only 53 members have used their right while eight MLAs have not submitted even a single query in either of the two categories.
In the House of 89 (87 elected plus two nominated women MLAs), 24 members including Chief Minister Omar Abdullah were Ministers while PDP legislator Sartaj Madni was Deputy Speaker (the Presiding Officer).
Three National Conference MLAs enjoyed status of Ministers in their capacity as chairpersons of Boards and Commissions. They included Kafeel-ur-Rehman, Vice Chairman, Pahari Welfare and Advisory Board, Shamima Firdous, Chairperson, State Women Commission and Radhey Shyam Sharma, Vice Chairman Kissan Welfare and Advisory Board.
The Ministers, Presiding Officers and the Chairpersons or Vice Chairpersons of Boards/Commissioner/Corporations with Ministerial status were not entitled to raise questions. Their number comes out at 28 (24 Ministers, 1 PO and 3 Vice Chairpersons), which means that 61 members were entitled to ask questions. Of 25 Ministers in the Cabinet including the Chief Minister, 24 were MLAs while Planning Development Minister Ajay Sadhotra was lone MLC.
Worthwhile to mention here that presently, there was no Speaker in the Legislative Assembly after Mohammad Akbar Lone had resigned on January 15 to join the Cabinet as Higher Education Minister. Deputy Speaker Sartaj Madni has been discharging the duties of the Speaker.
Sources said out of eight MLAs, who have not asked a single question, there were some recently dropped Ministers of the National Conference. A couple of senior leaders of opposition have also not forwarded any question. While February 7 was last date for submission of questions, today was the last date for submission of Private Member’s bills and Resolutions.
Sources added that 53 MLAs have submitted a total of 1060 questions including 531 in starred category and 478 in un-starred category. The 53 MLAs were entitled to raise 530 questions each in two categories. One of them has asked one extra question as the queries received in starred category were 531 while these MLAs have not completed their quota in un-starred categories.
As against the entitlement of 530 questions in un-starred category, the Assembly Secretariat has received only 478 questions, 52 less than the authorized quota.
The starred category questions are debated during Question Hour in the Assembly. However, in the case of un-starred questions, the Government had to give only written replies to the MLAs in the Assembly.
Each MLA, who is not a Government functionary, is eligible to ask 20 questions in the budget session of the Legislature—10 each in starred and un-starred categories.
There have been very few MLAs, who have submitted Private Member’s Bills and Resolutions. The MLAs were entitled to submit five Private Member’s Bills each. Going by 61 MLAs, the figure could have been 305. However, the Assembly Secretariat has only 62 Private Member’s Bills with them including the pending bills of previous sessions.
Similarly, the Assembly Secretariat has received 66 Private Member’s Resolutions though every MLA was entitled to ask 4 Resolutions each.
There was one Government bill pending with the Assembly Secretariat while one bill was with the Select Committee of the House. The Council Secretariat has also sent three Private Member’s bills, passed by the Legislative Council, to the Assembly for consideration.
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