Naidu enters House after 31 mnths, MLAs take oath
Telugu Desam Party (TDP) president N Chandrababu Naidu on Friday entered the House after a gap of more than 31 months in the capacity of chief minister.
Telugu Desam Party (TDP) president N Chandrababu Naidu on Friday entered the House after a gap of more than 31 months in the capacity of chief minister.
Naidu bowed down and touched the steps of the assembly building as a mark of reverence, before entering the hall, amid thunderous applause from the TDP, Jana Sena and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) members, who hailed his return to the assembly.
The first session of the 16th state legislative assembly commenced on Friday to enable the newly-elected members take their oath. The two-day session will conclude on Saturday after the election of the new speaker and deputy speaker of the assembly.
It was on November 19, 2021, when Naidu walked out of the assembly with tears in his eyes following alleged humiliating comments from the then ruling YSR Congress Party members against him and his wife.
Before leaving the House, the TDP chief declared that it was not an honourable House but a Kaurava Sabha (House of Kauravas who had humiliated Pandavas in Mahabharata). He vowed that he would re-enter the assembly only in the capacity of the chief minister.
Later, he broke down in front of media persons, stating that he had never faced such a humiliation in his four-decades of political life. He alleged that then chief minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy was chuckling when his party MLAs were passing unsavoury comments against him and his family members.
In the recent assembly elections, Naidu’s TDP, in alliance with Jana Sena Party and the BJP recorded a landslide victory winning 164 out of 175 seats in the state assembly, restricting the YSRCP to just 11 seats. Naidu was sworn in as the chief minister for a fourth term on June 12.
After stepping into the assembly, Naidu took oath as the member of the House, followed by his deputy Pawan Kalyan and other cabinet colleagues and MLAs. Senior TDP member Gorantla Buchaiah Chowdary administered the oath of office to the newly-elected MLAs.
Interestingly, YSRCP president YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, who got re-elected from Pulivendula assembly constituency, was accorded priority to take oath as an MLA, ahead of other members, though he doesn’t have the leader of opposition status. His party requires at least 18 MLAs to get the LOP status, but it has only 11 MLAs in the house.
Yet, the TDP government gave the privilege to Jagan of taking his oath before the rest of the MLAs did. “Naidu decided that the YSRCP president be given due respect, though the latter is not a leader of opposition in the assembly,” a TDP leader familiar with the matter said.
Though Jagan is like any other ordinary MLA, the government ordered that his convoy be allowed up to the main entrance of the assembly. The YSRCP chief stepped into the assembly minutes before his turn came to take the oath and took his seat in the back rows. Soon after taking the oath, he left the House.