'He always had a choice to resign and walk toward the sunset in protest.' 'Instead, he chose to be a mute witness to one of the most sordid chapters of India's parliamentary history when MPs were bought up like cattle to steer the nuclear deal through,' says M K Bhadrakumar.
Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee may have been expelled by his party, CPI(M), but his tenure as an MP, or for that matter, as the presiding officer of the Lower House remains unaffected, say constitutional and legal experts.
Lok Sabha Television channel, claimed to be the first in the world to be run by the Legislature, will start its experimental run from May 11, a day after the the commencement of the second phase of the budget session.
As the House re-assembled at 1600 hours, Speaker Somnath Chatterjee appealed to members to discuss the contentious water-sharing issue in a dispassionate and responsible manner.
BJP patriarch Vajpayee and Lok Sabha Speaker Chatterjee, the senior-most and the only two ten-term MPs in the 14th Lok Sabha, will not be contesting the general elections this time for different reasons.
As a newspaper article with critical references to him created a flutter in the House on Friday, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee said on Saturday that he had never held that he was above criticism.
Ram Gopal Yadav, whose Samajwadi Party heads the UP government, accused BJP of using the incident as an excuse to spread communal tension.
The Lok Sabha witnessed a heated debate Friday on an Ethics Committee report recommending Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra's expulsion in the cash-for-query issue, with the Opposition demanding she be allowed to speak in the House, and the government contending her views were heard by the panel.
With Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray targeting some Members of Parliament from Bihar, including Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad Yadav, in an editorial in party mouthpiece Saamana, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee on Wednesday said that such references amounted to contempt of the House.
Action against Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee was decided well before the trust vote, but was not announced lest it should affect discussion over issues that prompted the party to withdraw support to the UPA Government, Kerala Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan said.
Within hours of Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee's expulsion from the CPI-M, several leaders from the ruling UPA coalition thronged his residence to express their solidarity with one expressing readiness to accept the veteran Marxist in his party.
The Rs 3 crore project is expected to be completed within 15 months by Independence Day next year.
In a letter to Chatterjee, Vajpayee endorsed the NDA's plans not to attend Lok Sabha for a day as a mark of protest against the speaker.
Chatterjee told a private TV channel that he had already appealed to Banerjee to end her hunger srike and join the Lok Sabha session.
The expulsion of Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee from the Communist Party of India-Marxist for defying the party diktat to step down ends on a bitter note the political journey of a man who was the Marxist outfit's most articulate face with liberal views in Parliament for nearly four decades.
In the eye of storm over his refusal to quit, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee on Friday said he will retire at the end of his term and was not keen on rejoining CPI(M) which expelled him recently.
Surprised at his name being proposed for the Presidential post, former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee has said he will consider the move if there is a large consensus on it.
Somnath Chatterjee said as speaker of Parliament of the world's largest democracy, having to undergo frisking at the airport was an affront to India.
Breaking his silence, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee on Friday ruled out quitting and hit out at the Communist Party of India Marxist for demanding his resignation, saying it cannot give any direction to him in his Constitutional office."I have consciously taken the principled decision to uphold the Constitution of India at the risk of being unjustifiably dubbed as anti-party," he said in a five-page statement.
NDA on Wednesday boycotted Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee's all-party meeting aimed at defusing the stalemate over the Opposition demand to dismiss Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav.
In a stinging attack at his former party, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee said on Tuesday that the Communist Party of India-Marxist has reduced itself to a "non-actor" in national politics after withdrawing support to the Congress-led coalition describing the action as a "big blunder".
The speaker said: "Whoever is responsible has not done credit either to himself or to this great institution."
The Lok Sabha speaker will meet the Leader of Opposition over breakfast on Tuesday to discuss ways to break the deadlock over the opposition boycott of parliamentary committees.
Noting that communalisation and criminalisation have "greatly vitiated" the political system of the country, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee warned on Sunday that the future of democracy can face serious problems if urgent corrective steps are not taken.
Defending the decision to expel Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee from the party, CPI-M General Secretary Prakash Karat on Thursday said they did not have any other option but to take disciplinary action against the veteran Marxist as he refused to quit the post after a party directive.
"There are double standards with which the House is being run. There is a disregard of the Opposition," Malhotra said.
Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee and other passengers onboard a Jet Airways flight had a narrow escape on Sunday when their plane had to abort landing and take a 'go-around' after the pilot spotted another aircraft on the runway.The Southern China Airlines was on the ground and was taxiing for take off on runway 29. The aircraft came onto the runway due to some apparent communication gap.
Communist Party of India-Marxist general secretary Prakash Karat on Saturday said his party has not taken any decision yet to ask Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee to quit office. "No, that is not correct. There is no such decision as yet," Karat told PTI over phone when asked whether the party has asked Chatterjee to step down and that he would quit on Monday.
Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee, who was expelled by the Communist Party of India-Marxist for refusing to quit his post despite the party directive, has expressed his desire to quit politics and do charitable work, former CPI-M MP Saifuddin Chowdhury claimed.
Singh, who drove to Chatterjee's residence in New Delhi, did not speak to the waiting media persons after the meeting that lasted about 10 minutes.
Speaker urges unambiguity in rule-making
Joining issues with the British delegation in Malaysia, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee on Friday asserted that no "deal" was made to support Malaysia's candidature to a senior post in the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association election for which is to be held tomorrow.
"Personally I have lost my father for the second time in Jyoti Basu's death," former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee on Sunday said expressing his deep shock over the Marxist patriarch's death.
Chatterjee had convened an all-party meeting last week at the end of which he had even suggested that a Presidential reference be made to the Supreme Court for opinion on its order.
Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee on Tuesday appeared lukewarm to the speculations on bringing him back to the Communist Party of India-Marxist, saying that he would not appeal to the party.
Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee has been left out of the whip issued by CPI-M to its MPs to vote against the government in the trust vote on July 22.
The NDA leaders also took strong exception to the Speaker informing the media about the tape recordings of the proceedings he sent to Advani on the "behaviour" of the opposition MPs in the House.
Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee will soon decide the fate of the 19 Members of Parliament who defied their party whips during the trust vote on July 22. These MPs can be disqualified under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution.
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