New Delhi: With all eyes on the no-confidence motion underway in Parliament, the opposition parties pressed for more time in order to debate the motion.
Presiding over the proceedings, Speaker Sumitra Mahajan announced that the trust vote would be held at 6 pm with both NDA and opposition parties getting seven hours to debate the motion.
Congress’ MP Mallikarjun Kharge criticised the short time given to argue the motion. Requesting the speaker to not put a time limit on the debate, the MP said that no-confidence motions have been known to stretch for over two days in history.
The BJP has been allotted 3 hours and 33 minutes to speak while the Congress has been allotted 38 minutes.
Referring to the time allotted, Kharge said that 38 minutes were not enough for the party to voice the issues of 130 crore Indians.
Even Telugu Desam Party MP Galla Jayadev, who initiated the discussion on the motion on Friday, said that in the history of no-confidence motions, no one has ever given a speech under an hour long.
However, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar slammed the Opposition parties for attempting to parry for more time, claiming that Kharge was trying to play Test cricket during a one-day match.
With the BJD staging a walk out and BJP ally Shiv Sena announcing that it will stay away from Parliament to symbolise its opposition of the BJP, the total number of the Lok Sabha has reduced to 495. The majority mark is 249 votes.
At the beginning of the discussion, the Speaker had offered to skip lunch to be able to meet the 6 pm target for the vote. But with speeches extending their prescribed time limits, the voting is expected to take place after than 6 pm.
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