Legislative Assembly is fun and frolic too...

OFF-TRACK

Amitabh Shukla

Covering the proceedings of Delhi Assembly could be tedious and monotonous for most journalists. However, for me it is time to assess the verbal strength of our public representatives, their wit, humour or their inability on all these counts. As only a little over half the time of the total duration of the Assembly is used for raising meaningful issues concerning the public and the rest drowned in cacophony of sounds and issues to outwit each other, we have to look at the non-debating side also.

Sometimes one feels sorry for the Speaker. He has to be constantly on guard to check any verbal attack that cannot be the part of the proceedings and has to be deleted. For many the Constitutional post could draw comparison with the school teacher who is out to discipline the truant students in a classroom. The procedure is more or less the same as in a classroom – the MLA has to raise his hand if he wants to ask a supplementary. If he fails to grab the attention of the Speaker, he will shout to be heard.

If the MLAs become undisciplined, shout each other down, break the mikes and stand on their benches and the desk and the proceedings of the House becomes difficult to conduct, the Speaker summons the Marshals. They first request the truant MLAs to walk out of their own. If the MLAs refuse, the Marshals carry them out of the House. However, this is never made an issue and the expelled MLAs can be seen sipping coffee outside the House or cracking jokes with each other. One could well understand what Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee has to go through which even prompted him to offer his resignation from the post. While he has to play referee to 545 members, the Speaker of the Delhi Assembly has only 70, making the job slightly easier.

Very few MLAs come prepared to the House on the subject they are supposed to speak. While some fumble for words, the others merely repeat what one of their more prepared colleagues has already spoken. When one of the MLAs who had never opened his mouth, stood up to speak on an issue, almost every legislator clapped. "Some of the legislators never open their mouth in the entire five years," remarked a senior MLA on the applaud which the first timer got in the House.

Despite the discipline imposed by the Speaker, the legislators do not hesitate to bring their mobile phones in the House. While most of them do not talk on their mobiles while in the House, some of them do not want to miss that important call and talk freely. Same for the senior officials in their designated gallery. Some of them take the calls even as they are busy taking notes concerning their department.

MLAs, addicted to chewing tobacco or gutka, cannot concentrate on the discussion unless they have their mouths full with their choice of brands. As the press gallery is just above the House, they take out their packets discreetly, tear it open and place the contents in their mouth. Some even pass it around to their fellow legislators if they happen to share the same taste and brand.

The Fourth Estate is as integral a part of the assembly as the legislators themselves. Whenever a MLA speaks well he looks up to the press gallery for approval from those present. A hand signal indicates that he had spoken well and would be covered in the next day's paper. Not satisfied, the MLA concerned invariably calls up the Reporters and requests for coverage so that the people in his constituency know that he actually spoke. When a minister fails to reply properly to the questions posed, his PR officials again call up to explain what the Minister actually meant and said. It can never be boring or uneventful if one is dealing with the representatives of the people in a democracy.

(March 2007)