New Delhi, Feb 4 : Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on Friday appeared visibly anguished and asked members to refrain from making any disrespectful comments against the Chair inside and outside the House and also on social media. Om Birla’s reactions came a day after Trinmool MP Mahua Moitra criticised the Chair on Twitter. “Honourable members, I would like to raise an issue. Whether inside the house or outside, comments made on the Chair are not good for the dignity of the House. The dignity of the house is sacrosanct and every member respects it. The Chair tries to be impartial and work impartially and runs the house as per the rules.
I request that members should refrain from making comments about the chair inside or outside the house,” Birla said without naming Mohua Mitra. I have taken the comments made inside and outside the House seriously, he added. “Comment on the Chair inside and outside the House violate dignity and decorum of the House. It is the endeavor of the Chair that the House functions fairly as per rules and procedures,” Birla said. He further said that dignity of the house needs to be maintained by all the honorable members. Birla said that the member on the Chair also has all the constitutional rights of the Speaker.
He further said that if the members feel that differences with Chair need to be resolved, they can come to the chamber and share their grievances with the Chair. On Thursday, Mahua Moitra got angry when she was not allowed additional time to finish her address by Rama Devi on Chair. Later, she took to Twitter to express her resentment. In a tweet she said, “LS Speaker had allotted AT LEAST 13 mins to me, when confronted in his chamber he claimed he was not in chair hence can’t be blamed.
When further cornered he said- It was my greatness that I even allowed you 13 mins in first place. Unbelievable.” “And who is Chair to interrupt me (taking up MY valuable time) to lecture me on whether I should speak with gussa or pyar? None of your business Madam. You can only correct me on rules. You are NOT the moral science teacher for LS,” she said in a second tweet. A number of Opposition leaders cutting across party lines expressed solidarity with Om Birla and emphasised over the need to maintain the dignity and decorum of the House. “We enjoy good relations with you. We all respect you. We can offer our views openly before you. We will co-operate fully with you,” Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhary said. AITC MP Sudip Bandhopadhyay said, “I share your feelings wholeheartedly.
And I am of the opinion that the prestige of the House should be kept at a level where we all remain committed to the principles, ideas and philosophy of the House.” “I was shocked to hear Speaker Birla today. While entering the House or going out I greet the chair. Not everything in the House can be done by our will. It is important for us to always respect the Chair. People will respect us only when we respect the House and the Chair,” said Arvind Sawant of the Shiv Sena. DMK’s A. Raja said, “I fully endorse the concerns by the Chair. We have very high regards for the Chair. Any inconvenience caused to the Chair by the members is not acceptable at all.” National Conference leader Farooq Abdullah said that the Speaker is the honour of the House and it is the responsibility of all of us members to uphold that honour. “We see you as a guardian of the House.
You are the master of the House. I assure you that we will respect the Chair. Forgive us if we have made a mistake,” said Abdullah. “Today we stand here with lot of pain with what happened yesterday. It was a very unfortunate incident. The rules are made to be followed. I have been here for over decade, we have not seen this kind of extreme behaviour. We all need to introspect,” said Supriya Sule of the NCP. BSP MP Ritesh Pandey too said that his party has directed all party MPs not to make any comments or indulge in a behaviour which insults the House or the Chair.
“That is always our endeavour. We follow all the orders we get from the Chair. The entire House is pained by what you had to suffer,” Pandey said. “You give all the members the protection as their guardian. If you are a parent, we are your children. Whatever happened yesterday in and out of the House should not happen. We should not undermine our own dignity,” said TRS MP Nageshwar Rao.
