HEY RAM! Oppn slams government for curtailing Budget session to four days on pretext of Ram Navami festival

PANJIM: The Opposition lashed out at the State Government’s decision to curtail Legislative Assembly’s upcoming Budget session to four-days, beginning from March 27 in pretext of Ram Navami festival. 

According to the bulletin issued by the Goa Legislative Assembly, the session will have four sittings that is on March 27, 28, 29 and 31. The House will not seat on March 30, on the day of Ram Navami. 

This is not the first time, the government decided to shorten the Assembly session.  It curtailed Winter Session held in January this year to four days, while the month-long Monsoon Session was shortened to 10 days, owing to panchayat elections.

 The Leader of Opposition Yuri Alemao slammed the government for short duration of the session and charged that Pramod Sawant led government has no guts to face the opposition. 

“Ram Nam Satya Hai done of one day of the Session by rattled BJP government, which has no guts to face opposition,” he said. 

GFP party president and MLA Vijai Sardesai demanded that the session be extended by one more day and be curtailed on April 3. 

He questioned whether government was not aware about Ram Navami date well in advance when the Assembly schedule was finalized. 

Sardesai pointed out that in Goa Ram Navami is marked as restricted holiday for government sector while in rest of India it is declared as public holiday. “Let government declare Ram Navami as public holiday if they want to curtail the session,” he said. 

Sardesai said that in the past too, Assembly sessions have been held on Restricted Holidays or the day is extended. 

Former Union minister Ramakant Khalap said, “I don’t know what the government gets by curtailing or having short sessions. It is constitutional right of every MLA to raise public issues in the House. And for that they need to be given time. Sessions, especially Budget, need to be of longer duration as there are public, non public, policy issues that needs discussion and debate.”

Opposition MLAs pointed out that the government had held only 4-day Winter Session in January with no private members day. They also said that the government had curtailed the 25-day monsoon session in July-August, last year, to just ten days on the pretext of the State Election Commission’s code of conduct for the panchayat elections. It was then promised that the “deferred” session would be held later but the promise wasn’t kept.

In the 40-member State Assembly, BJP has support of 33 MLAs including MGP and independents. The opposition comprises of only seven MLAs- three from Congress, two from AAP and one each of GFP and Revolutionary Goans party.