The first session of the new Lok Sabha (18th) is starting from June 24, but it is still not clear who will be the Speaker of the Lok Sabha. What is clear is that the election of the Speaker of the Lok Sabha will be held on June 26. It is expected that on June 25, the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) will announce the name of its candidate.
This time the buzz about the post of Lok Sabha Speaker has increased because the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which had secured a majority on its own in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections, does not have a clear majority this time. It is dependent on its allies to cross the magical figure of 272 in the Lok Sabha.
In such a situation, it is also being speculated that the major ally of BJP and ruling party of Andhra Pradesh Telugu Desam Party (TDP) is pressurizing BJP to give it the post of Lok Sabha Speaker. Such news had come even when this time NDA government was being formed again under the leadership of Narendra Modi. The argument given by TDP in favour of this demand is that when it was part of the first NDA government under the leadership of Atal Bihari Vajpayee at the center, then the party’s GMC Balayogi used to be the Lok Sabha Speaker.
Talking to some senior BJP leaders, it is clear that TDP has shown interest in the post of Lok Sabha Speaker but has not exerted any pressure. BJP leaders claim that the stand taken by TDP in public is the same in the internal meetings of BJP and TDP. TDP has repeatedly reiterated in public that the Lok Sabha Speaker should be from NDA and all the constituent parties should sit together and decide the name of the new Speaker.
Sources connected to BJP say that two strategies have been adopted to ensure that TDP does not exert much pressure for the post of Lok Sabha Speaker. First, after TDP, the second largest partner in NDA, Janata Dal United (JDU), has been convinced not to stake its claim on the post of Lok Sabha Speaker and publicly say that JDU will support the BJP candidate. JDU senior leader KC Tyagi also said in a public statement that the claim to the post of Lok Sabha Speaker is of the largest party and hence his party will support the BJP candidate. However, Tyagi denies that this statement has been given by JDU at the behest of BJP.
To avoid pressure from TDP for the post of Lok Sabha Speaker, BJP’s second strategy is to hold talks with Congress. The meeting of new Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju with Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge is being linked to this. Although Rijiju called it a formal meeting before the new session of Parliament, people in the Congress camp are saying that BJP wants the new Speaker of Lok Sabha to be elected unanimously and there should be no election for this post. The party feels that if Congress also comes in favor of the consensus candidate, then TDP will not be able to put pressure on it.
It is also coming out from within the Congress that on this proposal of BJP, the Congress has put its condition regarding the post of Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker. In fact, despite there being no constitutional obligation, it has been a parliamentary tradition of India that the Lok Sabha Speaker is elected from the ruling party and the Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker is from the opposition camp. But in 2014, the BJP did not let this post go to the Congress camp and helped AIADMK’s M Thambidurai to occupy this post. From 2019 to 2024 i.e. during the 17th Lok Sabha, elections were not held for the post of Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker and this post remained vacant.
BJP leaders say that no final decision has been taken in the party so far on the Congress’ demand for the post of Deputy Speaker of Lok Sabha. On June 20, Bhartruhari Mahtab, who recently left Biju Janata Dal (BJD) and became MP for the seventh time on a BJP ticket, was appointed to the post of Protem Speaker. The job of the Protem Speaker is to administer oath to the new MPs. The parliamentary tradition has been that this temporary post is given to the most senior member of the Lok Sabha who has become MP the most number of times.
After Mahtab’s appointment, Congress has accused BJP of breaking all parliamentary traditions one by one. In fact, Congress says that according to the established parliamentary tradition, one of the two MPs elected for the eighth time should have been the Protem Speaker. One of them is Virendra Kumar of BJP. The other is K Suresh of Congress. Virendra Kumar is a minister in the Modi government. Therefore, Congress was hoping that K Suresh would be made the Protem Speaker. But this did not happen.
Talking to Congress leaders, it was revealed that if BJP does not reach a consensus for the post of Lok Sabha Speaker, then the Lok Sabha Speaker’s election on 26 June will not be held by consensus and the NDA candidate will have to face the India Alliance candidate for this post.