Jagan urges Andhra Pradesh Assembly Speaker to recognise him as Leader of Opposition
The Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Assembly notified under Article 208 of the Constitution do not prescribe mandatory 10% seats for a leader of a party to be recognised as the Leader of Opposition, says the YSRCP president in a letter to Speaker Ch. Ayyanna Patrudu
YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) president Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy on June 25 (Tuesday) wrote a letter to Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly Speaker Ch. Ayyanna Patrudu, urging the latter to recognise him as the Leader of Opposition (LoP) in the House.
Going by the precedents in the Lok Sabha, Delhi Assembly and the Assembly of undivided Andhra Pradesh, the Leader of Opposition status should be given to the YSRCP leader. The Leader of Opposition post was given to a leader belonging to the opposition parties though their numerical strength was less when compared to the total strength of the House, he argued.
Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy said that there were discussions in the public domain that the YSRCP would not be entitled to have the Leader of Opposition post because it did not have 10% members of the total strength of the House.
“The Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly notified under Article 208 of the Constitution do not prescribe any such mandatory percentage of seats for a leader of a party to be recognised as the Leader of Opposition. Nor has there been any convention on the insistence of the 10% strength on the floor of the House for the opposition parties,” said Mr. Jagan Moha Reddy.
In 1984, the TDP got the Leader of Opposition status in Lok Sabha even though it secured only 30 seats of the total 543 in the House. In 1994, the Indian National Congress (INC) was given the Leader of Opposition status in undivided Andhra Pradesh though its strength was only 26 of the total 294 seats. In 2015, the LoP post was given to the BJP in the Delhi Assembly though they secured only three of the total 70 seats, Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy pointed out.
The LoP, with the associated rights of addressing the matters of grave public concern, imparts the necessary bi-partisanship to the proceedings of the House and the legitimacy of ensuring participation of divergent and opposing views on the policies of the government, he said.
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