The Manipur Speaker Yumnam Khemchand on Friday accepted the resignation of Paonam Brojen, a Congress MLA representing the Wangjing Tentha constituency. The resignation letter was submitted to the office of the Speaker on August 10.
Earlier, the Speaker had dismissed the disqualification petition against Mr. Brojen. The Speaker announced that with the acceptance of Mr. Brojen’s resignation, there are now 13 vacant seats in the Assembly of 60 members.
Mr. Khemchand said that those MLAs who have evidence that they had joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were disqualified. But in the case of Mr. Brojen, there is no such evidence, with the result that the disqualification petition which has been pending in the tribunal of the Speaker was dismissed on Friday.
Mr. Khemchand disclosed that the High Court of Manipur had directed the Speaker’s tribunal to keep the disqualification petition pending till August 3. “Now that the deadline had expired, the tribunal has dismissed the case. Since there is no other directive from the High Court, the MLA’s resignation letter was accepted,” he added.
Replying to a question as to why there was no live coverage of the Assembly session on Monday, Mr. Khemchand said that after becoming the Speaker, he had introduced live coverage of all sessions. But this time, he was more concerned with COVID-19 related risks to Assembly staff. “Over ten persons shall be present in the Assembly complex during the live coverage and the threat is there since they will mix with the Assembly staff,” he said.
Congress Legislative Party leader Okram Ibobi has said that apart from the failure to provide live coverage of the session, reporters were not allowed to take pens, mobile phones and note books inside the Assembly.
