The debate that involved 'em from dawn to dawn

Time of India

7 hours ago

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Lucknow: The 24-hour session of the UP legislative Assembly on 'Viksit Bharat Viksit Uttar Pradesh' had many of its women members, like RLD's Mithilesh Pal, BJP's Ketaki Singh and Saroj Sonker and Samajwadi Party's Indrani Verma waiting patiently for their turn to speak on the government's vision document.
Some till as late as 1.00 am and others till 3.30 am on Thursday.
There were also some who had spoken but still sat through the session whole night to listen to others, including Congress' Aradhna Misra 'Mona', SP's Puja Pal and BJP's Minakshi Singh and Krishna Paswan.
For the BJP members, it clearly sent a message that it was the subject of discussion which was important and not the late-hour and early-morning timing for the women legislators, while for members from Opposition, it was an opportunity to expose government's failure and for a few to come out with flying colours before their party bosses and last but not the least to be part of the history that was in the making.
It was the second such session in recent history to have been continued throughout the night, with a total of 189 speakers across party lines. A few legislators were pleading with the chair to include their names in the list of the speakers.
However, there were others who wanted to jump the long queue of speakers.
Earlier in October, 2019, the UP Assembly had held a 36-hour special session on sustainable development goals set up by the United Nations to mark the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi. Interestingly, leader of the House and Chief Minister
Yogi Adityanath
also made a few visits during the 24-hour discussion even as late as 9.30pm on Wednesday.
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The CM remained in the House until 11.11pm and patiently heard members across the party line before returning the next morning.
Speaker Satish Mahana also remained in the chair till around 10.20pm and so was present Finance and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Suresh Khanna. Khanna remained in the House until around 11.45pm. BJP member Anupama Jaiswal then replaced Mahana in the chair before unattached MLA Manoj Pandey replaced her at 11.37pm.
SP MLA Indrani Varma from Bhinga in Shravasti waited for her turn to speak until 1 am and left only after making her statement. So did Saiyyada Khatoon from Domariyaganj who spoke before Indrani at 11.04pm. BJP's Minakshi Singh spoke at 10.01 pm but remained in the House until wee hours giving patient hearing to other members. The women members' activeness could be gauged from the fact that Congress MLA Mona Misra remained in the House whole night just like BJP MLA Ketki Singh.
Malihabad MLA Jai Devi was also seen seated in the House throughout the night. Rae Bareli MLA Aditi Singh also was in the House until 1.45am.
A heated exchange of words was also witnessed between Maant MLA Rajesh Chaudhary and Varanasi Cantt MLA Saurabh Srivastava, who was acting as chief whip in the absence of Ram Naresh Agnihotri. Rajesh could not speak during the time allocated for members from his Braj region which was between 9pm and 12 midnight. Since those who had to speak between 6pm and 9pm continued until 11pm and those who had to speak after that could not speak, Rajesh objected to it.
It was only after the spat that seven MLAs from Braj and West UP were accommodated in the 12 midnight to 3 am slot.
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