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Amid din in Punjab House, Mann moves confidence motion
Punjab CM Bhagwant Mann on Tuesday moved a confidence motion in the state assembly after the session got off to a stormy start with three adjournments, ‘naming’ of all 15 Congress MLAs present, and a walkout by two BJP members
Punjab chief minister (CM) Bhagwant Mann on Tuesday moved a confidence motion in the state assembly after the session got off to a stormy start with three adjournments, ‘naming’ of all 15 Congress MLAs present, and a walkout by two BJP members.
Mann, who moved the motion despite protests by the Congress and the BJP, targeted both parties, accusing them of “conniving” with each other. The BJP was trying to lure the legislators, and the Congress was supporting its ‘Operation Lotus’ to topple the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government in the state, he claimed after introducing the motion.
The trust motion was tabled by the CM two days after Governor Banwarilal Purohit, with whom the AAP government had a deadlock for days over the agenda for the House, summoned the assembly session. The session was called by the governor after the state government shared with him the legislative and government business to be taken up during the assembly session. There was, however, no mention of the confidence motion in the communication sent to Raj Bhawan.
As soon as speaker Kultar Singh Sandhwan, while reading the report of the business advisory committee (BAC) of the state assembly, announced that Mann would move the confidence motion, there was a ruckus in the House, with members of both BJP and Congress opposing the move. BJP MLAs Ashwani Sharma and Jangi Lal Mahajan objected to having been kept out of the BAC meeting and walked out of the House in protest.
Congress leader and leader of opposition Partap Singh Bajwa also questioned the government’s move to table the motion all of a sudden after the governor had denied permission for it. He said there is no provision in the rules and regulations of the state assembly that says that a ruling party can bring a trust motion. “During the business advisory committee meeting, when I asked about the confidence motion, no clear reply was given,” Bajwa told the speaker, registering his protest. Mann then got up to speak, but Congress members, including Amarinder Singh Raja Warring and Sukhbir Singh Khaira, sprang to their feet and started pressing for zero hour, besides opposing the confidence motion. The speaker asked them to take their seats and show respect to the leader of the house (Mann), but they were adamant and kept standing. The speaker adjourned the House for 15 minutes.
When the proceedings resumed, cabinet minister Aman Arora questioned the opposition parties’ attempts to oppose the trust motion but he was repeatedly interrupted by the Congress members.
Bajwa called the confidence motion illegal, only to be countered by Arora who raised questions over the governor’s action in the matter. The minister also accused the Congress of acting as the ‘B-team’ of the BJP whereas Mann insisted that any motion or bill can be moved in the House with the speaker’s permission. “Why are they feeling so restless if ‘Operation Lotus’ is failing?” he asked.
The Congress members rushed to the well of the House, raising slogans, and were named by the speaker for disrupting the proceedings. Sandhwan told them not to attend the proceedings for the remainder of the day and also adjourned the House for 10 minutes, telling the marshals to take them out. When the House assembled, the Congress members were still in the House and the speaker again adjourned it for the third time, directing that they be marshaled out. Later, all 15 Congress MLAs present went out, raising slogans against the state government. The Congress has 18 MLAs in the state. Later, the CM moved the confidence motion and the AAP members welcomed it by thumping their desks. Mann and Arora spoke during the discussion on the motion before the speaker adjourned the House till Thursday. The discussion and voting on the confidence motion will now be held on Monday (October 3). Three SAD legislators and one BSP MLA were among the opposition members present at that time.
The AAP governments and Purohit were at loggerheads over the session from the time governor canceled the September 22 special session called for holding the trust vote, citing the absence of specific rules. The cancellation triggered a war of words, and then the state cabinet on Thursday decided to call the regular session on September 27 with a revised agenda. The governor’s office later sent a missive asking for details of the legislative business, telling Mann that his legal advisers were not
