PANAJI
Armed with a brute majority, the Pramod Sawant government continued to ride roughshod over the Opposition's complaints of holding short legislative sessions and cut short by a day the upcoming Budget session of the Goa legislative Assembly set to begin on March 27.
A revised notice issued by Legislature Secretary Namrata Ulman said the Assembly session will commence on March 27 and go on till March 31, with a holiday on March 30. The holiday is on account of 'Ram Navami' which is however not a 'public holiday' in the normal course.
Leader of Opposition, Yuri Alemao was quick to react and took to micro-blogging site Twitter to slam the government for further reducing by a day an already short Budget session.
"Ram Naam Satya Hai’ done of one day of the 4th Session of 8th Goa Legislative Assembly by a rattled BJP government in Goa which has no guts to face Opposition,” Alemao said in a tweet.
The functioning of the current Goa legislative assembly and the previous House has been adversely affected since 2018. First, it was the health condition of then Chief Minister the late Manohar Parrikar followed by the Covid-19 pandemic which the governments of the day had cited to keep legislative business to a bare minimum, restricted to mandatory government legislation and financial business.
In the previous winter session held in January, the government had assured the confrontationist Opposition led by Alemao that a longer budget session would be held but is now ruled out, potentially setting the stage for another round of government versus Opposition acrimony.
