The issue of ‘opposition status’ has become a political controversy in Andhra Pradesh politics. This issue is creating a stir after former Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy made it clear that they will attend the assembly only if they are given opposition status.
However, the ruling party rejected the YSRCP’s request, saying that opposition status is possible only if there are 10 percent members as per the rules. Speaker Ayyannapatrudu has also made his stance clear on this issue. Since YSRCP members are not attending the assembly meetings on that basis, the entire assembly meetings are being held unilaterally.
Jaganmohan Reddy is demanding that the time allotted to the Chief Minister be allotted to him even if he is not given opposition status. However, the assembly and parliament sessions are mostly held according to conventions rather than rules. In our country, the ruling and opposition parties are not showing interest in constructive debates.
It became customary to engage in personal criticism of each other and create obstacles in sessions. Jaganmohan Reddy also acted similarly when he was in power for five years. If Chandrababu stayed away from the sessions on the grounds that obscene remarks were made against his family members in the House, there was no attempt by the ruling party to bring him to the House.
In the same vein, if Jaganmohan Reddy is staying away from the meetings now, the ruling parties are not showing any initiative to bring him to the House. The intolerance shown by the ruling party towards the presence of the opposition parties leads to such situations.
Chief Minister Chandrababu expressed his helplessness by saying that opposition status should be given by the people, not the government. Deputy Chief Minister Pawan Kalyan said that there is no opposition in AP and that the people have not given it a chance. Targeted the YCP in the Assembly, he said that the 11 seats they got are a clear example of the difficulties faced by the people under the YCP rule.
Now, it is creating interest that Dr. Subramanian Swamy filed a PIL in the High Court seeking opposition status for YSRCP. He said that even though YSRCP has a small number of MLAs in the Assembly, it is right for it to be in the opposition compared to the ruling party and other opposition parties.
BJP state president and MP D. Purandeswari said that it is not right for Jagan to forget the responsibility given by the people and that he should go to the Assembly and raise public issues. She made it clear that opposition status will come only if there is a certain number.
She flagged that all the people of Andhra know that the honorable house was converted into Kaurava house in the previous government. She criticized that it is shameful for Jagan not to speak on public issues in the Assembly and to go for attendance.
However, the opposition leader in the Council Botsa Satyanarayana deplored Pawan Kalyan’s ignorant comments on the issue of opposition recognition, saying that they have no objection to him being in the opposition.
He said that even if YCP gets 40 percent of the votes and Jana Sena gets six percent of the votes, they agree that representation will be based on seats since they have more seats. However, he said that currently three parties are in power in the Legislative Assembly, and since the remaining party is YCP, they have requested to be recognized as the opposition.