Speaker resigns, says uncomfortable with the post

Bhubaneswar, Mar 31 (UNI) Orissa Assembly Speaker Maheswar Mohanty, who resigned from the post in the wake of sexual harassment charge against him by a lady Marshal, said he felt uncomfortable the way attempts were made in the past few days to pollute the dignity of the office of the Speaker with purely political motives.

''I was shocked to know that some members, knowing the truth well, had revolted against me politically without keeping in mind the prestige and dignity of the Speaker's post,'' Mr Mohanty said in his resignation letter addressed to Deputy Speaker Prahallad Dora.

He further said the baseless allegations by a woman employee of the Assembly, against whom he had taken disciplinary action, had pointed finger at the dignity of the House and the Speaker's post.

Mr Mohanty said it upset him as those who had praised him during his last four years of tenure have tried to create an unprecedented situation based on these false allegations.

''I have also proposed that all these allegations against me be probed by a House Committee and withdraw myself from conducting the proceedings while delegating all powers to the Deputy Speaker to run the business of the House''.

Stating that he became a victim of 'political conspiracy', Mr Mohanty said one should keep it in mind that if such indiscipline be given political patronage then one could not rule out reccurrence of such incident.

Mr Mohanty, who had all along been maintaining that he would not resign from the post as the allegations were false and baseless, today said he decided to submit the resignations as the House was adjourned sine die and the Opposition did not agree to his proposal to constitute a House Committee to probe into the allegations.

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