Chhatisgarh assembly’s first session from Jan 6

Raipur, December 19

The first session of Chhattisgarh’s fourth legislative assembly is likely to commence from first week of January 2014. According to information, the session will start from January 6, the day when State’s third legislative assembly will dissolve.

“It will be joint budget session that will be conducted in two phases –in January and then in February and March,” sources said.

In the first phase, all the legislators will take oath and full-time Speaker would be elected. The oath to House members will be administered by protem speaker for which Congress MLA Satyanarayan Sharma’s name is on top on the basis of his seniority.

The budget session will start with Governor’s customary address followed by swearing-in ceremony of MLAs.

In the second phase, CM Raman Singh, who also holds finance department, will present the State budget for fiscal 2014-15. His budget address will be followed by debate budgetary grants for every department. The second phase is likely to start from third week of February and conclude in second week of March.

With Brijmohan Agrawal and Amar Agrawal getting berth in Raman Singh cabinet and Premprakash Pandey and Ajay Chandrakar preferring ministerial post to Speaker’s job, Gaurishankar Agrawal is set to become fourth Speaker of Chhattisgarh Vidhan Sabha. His name will be announced after oath-taking ceremony. The first three Speakers of the House were Rajendra Prasad Shukla from Congress, and BJP’s Premprakash Pandey and Dharamlal Kaushik.

It is learnt that CM Raman Singh had himself convinced Gaurishankar Agrawal to take the assignment of conducting State assembly for full-time as it would be difficult for him to justify the induction of three Agrawals in the cabinet by ignoring claims of other deserving candidates.

The opposition Congress, on the other hand, is gearing up to stake claim on post of deputy Speaker. The ruling BJP, in previous two terms, had kept the post with it. The post was held by BJP’s Banwari Lal Agrawal and Dharamjeet Singh from Congress in the first legislative assembly when Congress was in power. In second and third legislative assemblies, the post was entrusted to BJP’s Badridhar Diwan and Narayan Chandel.