Bhubaneswar: Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today directed state departments to ensure Odia copies of the Bills be distributed among the members before they were taken up for consideration of the House.
Patnaik issued the direction after opposition Congress and BJP created pandemonium in the assembly during the post-lunch period demanding Odia copies of Odisha Value Added Tax (Amendment) Bill, 2015 and Odisha Police Bill, 2015 taken up for introduction in the House.
"The Chief Minister has directed all the department secretaries to ensure distribution of Odia language copies of Bills being introduced in the assembly," Parliamentary Affairs minister B K Arukh said in a statement in the assembly.
"The Odia copies of the two Bills will be provided to the members before they are taken for consideration of the House," he said.
The Chief minister's action came after the government introduced two Bills copies of which were in English. The issue was raised by Leader of Opposition Narasingha Mishra of Congress accusing the state government of ignoring the Odia language.
"You have been denying rights of the members who do not read and write English language. Therefore, the government must ensure that the Odia translation of the English copies should also be distributed among the members as per the provision of the Orissa Official Language Act, 1954," Mishra said.
The opposition members comprising both the Congress and BJP separately rushed to well of the House and shouted slogans against the government as Speaker Niranjan Pujari did not pay any attention towards their demand of distributing Odia copies of the Bills.
The opposition members walked out of the House as soon as the Speaker allowed Finance minister Pradip Kumar Amat to present the state budget for the year 2015-16.
Soon after Arukh's announcement on the Chief minister's direction, Mishra thanked Patnaik for responding to the concerns of the opposition members.
