Fmota News

*Upbeat BJD ready for budget session Bhubaneswar:* With the budget session of the State Assembly beginning on Tuesday, the ruling Biju Janata Dal is on cloud nine as it has braced up to take on a demoralized Opposition following its miserable drubbing in the just concluded panchayat polls.

However, the Opposition is aiming to train its gun on the government on the recent developments in the state.

While the ruling party is upbeat following its thumping majority in the panchayat polls, the Opposition seems to have flexed its muscles to take on the government on the issues like the Pipili gang rape and hooch tragedy.

Our morale is very high. We are ready to face the Opposition on all issues. The state government is open to discussion under the parliamentary practices on any issue the Opposition want to raise, parliamentary affairs minister Raghunath Mohanty said.

Stating that since people of the state have shown the Opposition their real place in the recently concluded panchayat elections, Mohanty hoped that the latter should behave in the Assembly and should not resort to creating disturbances and try to stall important business of the House.

The Opposition Congress, despite the debacle in the rural polls, is quite confident to put the government on the floor.

Our morale is also too high. The Pipili gang rape case, the hooch tragedy and the series of cases relating to rape, murder and atrocity on women would haunt the ruling party for all time to come, leader of the Opposition Bhupinder Singh said.

The chief minister cannot shed his responsibility from the Pipili gang rape case by just removing the agriculture minister.

Following the disclosures of the National Commission for Women that the mess was due to the inaction of the police point fingers at the chief minister who heads the home department, Singh said.

As the hooch tragedy is an outcome of administrative blunder, the General Administration department is to be blamed for it. Being the head of the GA department, the chief minister cannot shirk his responsibility, he asserted.

Moreover, the panchayat elections have exposed the ruling party’s claim that it is honest and transparent.

He said that the misuse of government machineries and the use of money and muscle power by the ruling party would be exposed in the House.

The hapless BJP, following its pitiable show at the panchayat polls, is likely to make some noise on the issue of Pipili gang rape and hooch tragedy. But, it has no moral courage to give a reason to the victory of the ruling party at the polls. For, it has all along been insisting that the BJD was winning the elections by tempering the EVMs.

On the other hand, the House is likely to witness the ruling party’s diatribe against the Congress-led UPA government at the Centre.

The National Counter Terrorism Centre notification, which has become a raging national controversy following the Opposition by chief minister Naveen Patnaik, is likely to be played up by the ruling party in the House to shut up the Opposition Congress.

The BJD lawmakers are also likely to raise the issue of delay in getting the Presidential assent to the Odisha Excise Bill to counter the Opposition attack over the hooch tragedy.

The ruling party may also rake up the chief minister’s demand for imposition of mineral rent tax on profits made by the mine lease-holders.

However, the Budget this year would be overshadowed this session. As finance minister Prafulla Chandra Ghadei is presenting his 8th consecutive annual state budget, a record in the history of the state’s parliamentary practice, he is certainly going to exude greater confidence this time.

With state’s financial position continuing to be in sound footing, he would certainly make the Budget people-friendly.