NDA to boycott Lok Sabha on August 8

New Delhi, Aug 7: Agitated over the manner in which Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee allowed legislative business to be transacted in the House amid Opposition's protests, the NDA today decided to boycott the Lok Sabha and the routine Speaker's all-party meeting tomorrow.

The decision was taken at an emergency meeting of the leaders of NDA constituents at Leader of the Opposition L K Advani's residence this evening.

Addressing newspersons, BJP Deputy Leader Vijay Kumar Malhotra said the MPs belonging to NDA would stay away from the House and not claim any allowance for the day as they would not be signing the attendance register tomorrow. Instead, the MPs would sit on a dharna at the Mahatma Gandhi statue inside the Parliament House for what Mr Malhotra described ''the Speaker's attitude towards the Opposition.'' He said the meeting deplored the manner in which the Speaker had allowed business to be passed in the House when the Opposition members were protesting in the well of the Lok Sabha against the leak of the Pathak Authority report on the oil for food scam. It was not only objectionable but totally against the parliamentary convention, he said.

Asked whether the NDA had also decided to bring in a no-confidence against the Speaker, he said no decision had yet been taken in this regard.

Regarding the NDA's strategy in the Rajya Sabha, he said the NDA would decide about it tomorrow morning.

Criticising Mr Chatterjee's attitude, Mr Prabhunath Singh of the JD(U) said he had decided to boycott the House for the whole week. Mr Anant Gete (Shiv Sena) said the Speaker behaved like a Government official and ran the House in a ''very undemocratic manner''. Akali Dal leader Ratan Singh Ajnala and BJD leader Brij Kishore Tripathi, deploring the Speaker, said what had happened today in the Lok Sabha was against Parliament conventions.

Earlier, the NDA in a meeting in the morning had sought an apology from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for the leakage of the Pathak Authority's report to the media before it was laid in Parliament.

The NDA had also given notice for a privilege motion in the Lok Sabha against the leakage of the report which probed the Volcker's allegations about the non-contractual beneficiaries, including former External Affairs Minister Natwar singh and Congress Party, in the oil-for-food scam.

UNI