After its humiliating defeat in the December elections, the Congress suffered another blow on Thursday as the budget session started when the Gujarat Assembly Secretariat denied them the position of Leader of Opposition since it fell short by 10% of the total 182 seats in the House.
This is one seat short since the Congress won 17 seats against the BJP’s historic 156.
Gujarat Assembly Secretary DM Patel issued a letter to this effect late Wednesday evening to the leader of the Congress Legislative Party (CLP) and MLA from Anklav in central Gujarat.
Congress fails to get 182 seats
Shocked by this, Chavda told reporters that the Secretary’s letter stated that they were not eligible to get this post since the party did not have 10% of the 182 seats.
He pointed out that there was a rule and a tradition to allot the LOP’s post to the second-largest party in the State Assembly. Chavda said, “The Congress party had earlier given the post to the second largest party having 14 seats in the House.” He added that the party would examine if there was any legal remedy available for this.
Chavda said his party had written a letter to Assembly Speaker Shankar Chaudhary on January 18 and sent two subsequent reminders to the Speaker’s office that he had been appointed the CLP leader and that he be named the Leader of Opposition but there was no response.
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