TEAM HERALD
teamherald@herald-goa.com
PANJIM: Two important bills ~one pertaining to protection of medical practitioners and the other, an amendment bill giving right over the building and land to the flat owners are due to be tabled during the forthcoming Legislative Assembly session beginning October 9.
The session might also see, the House Committee headed by Francisco Pacheco tabling its report on the police-drug nexus, which is due for almost a year now.
A total of 1088 legislative assembly questions have been raised by legislators during the six-day session, which for the first time will be partially paperless. Each of the 25 MLAs have been permitted 18 questions (three starred and 15 unstarred) per day. It is interesting to note that Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) most vociferous legislator Vishnu Wagh has not tabled a single question for the session.
Though BJP-led government had vouched for assembly proceedings in Konkani or Marathi along with English since it came to power, it is surprising to note that not a single question has been asked in local language.
Legislature Secretary N B Subhedar said that there are 442 starred questions and 646 unstarred questions. About four government bills, including amendment to motor vehicle act, Goa cooperative society act, Amendment to Factories and Boil
ers Act, medical, etc would be tabled and are expected to be passed.
Leader of Opposition Pratapsing Rane has also moved a private member bill on the cooperative societies.
For the first time, the legislative assembly will have partially paperless proceedings since some MLAs have submitted their LAQs online. Importantly, the legislature department hopes to upload answers to the LAQs onto its official website either the same evening or next morning so that the public can access the LAQs and their answers online.
Along with the online replies, printed answers will also be supplied, Subedhar said.
The assembly session is expected to witness intense discussion on the impact of sand ban on construction industry, with opposition gearing up to grill State government over its failure in tackling law and order, casinos, tourism, soaring vegetable prices, etc.
There will be no assembly sessions on the two weekend days of October 12 and 13. Also, there is confusion over public holiday for Bakri Id which could be either on October 14 or 16.
Government has evoked Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, prohibiting assembly of more than five persons within 500m radius of the Assembly Complex, Porvorim.
