Srinagar: The Jammu and Kashmir Assembly will meet on Monday to elect its new Speaker, with senior NC leader and former minister Abdul Rahim Rather proposed for the post.
As per the list of business for Monday, released by the Assembly Secretariat, the house will meet at 10.30 a.m. and the election of the Speaker is the first item on the agenda.
Agriculture Production, Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, Cooperatives, and Election, Javid Ahmed Dar will move a resolution, reading: “That Advocate Abdul Rahim Rather, a member of this House, be chosen as the Speaker of the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly”. National Conference member Arjun Singh Raju will second the motion.
The election of the new Speaker will be easy as the National Conference has 41 members in the 90-member Assembly, while allies Congress and the CPI-M have six and one members, respectively. Furthermore, the Omar Abdullah government can also count on the support of the sole AAP member and six of the seven Independents.
The National Conference has offered the Deputy Speaker’s post to the BJP, which is the second largest party in the Assembly with 29 members – though one member has subsequently passed away. The party on Sunday chose Narender Singh for the post.
After the Speaker’s election, the members will gather in the Assembly hall at 11.30 a.m. for Lt Governor Manoj Sinha’s address, as per the list of business.
The Assembly will gather for the transaction of formal business, half an hour after the Lt Governor’s address, as per the agenda, adding that it is then that the new Speaker will then report and lay a copy of the Lt Governor’s address on the table of the house.
Members were also asked to take their seats in the house in the same order as approved by the Pro-tem Speaker under Rule 4 of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly.
(IANS)
