Agartala, March 9 (IANS): Tripura's Opposition Congress on Friday alleged the Left Front government was holding a minimum number of Assembly sessions to "restrict the democratic rights of the people and elected representatives".
"Since 2000, the Left Front government has been convening the sessions of the Tripura assembly on an average 18 days in a year. We are unable to raise many urgent issues relating to public interest due to lack of time," Leader of Opposition Ratan Lal Nath said. "The Commonwealth Parliamentary Forum (CPF) has urged all the states on a number of occasions to hold the assembly sessions for at least 60 days in a year in small states and 100 days in big States," he said.
The CPF is a parliamentary body with speakers and deputy speakers of all states as members and speaker of the Lok Sabha as its chairman.
The Congress leader said the Tripura Assembly session was only 13 days last year. This year's first and budget session of the State Assembly is now on and it would be adjourned sine die March 22 after 11 sittings.
Assembly Speaker Ramendra Chandra Debnath rejected the charges. "It would be good to hold assembly sessions for at least 60 days in a year in the small states and 100 days in the big states. But we need the government agenda for that, without any business or specific schedule, the sessions could not be convened," Debnath told IANS.
According to official estimates, a day's session costs Rs 10 lakh.
