On Monday, Rajya Sabha chairman Venkaiah Naidu announced that the elections for the post of deputy chairman of Rajya Sabha will be held on August 9. The Opposition parties are going to meet at 5:30 PM discuss a possible candidate for the Deputy Chairperson post.
The united Opposition and the ruling BJP will test their strength to elect deputy chairman of Rajya Sabha. The current deputy chairman PJ Kurien will retire on June 30. The current strength of the House stands at 245 but with four nominated members set to retire before the monsoon session the strength will stand at 241. To win, any side will require 122 members supporting their choice of candidate. While the Opposition counts on 117 votes, the NDA has around 115 votes.
Keeping in view the numbers, both the leading parties the Congress and the BJP have decided to back consensus candidate who can entice other parties. Sources in the Congress said it was willing to bow out of the race and support any candidate a united opposition. Insiders say, the leaders have already begun talks with the leaders of the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) and Trinamool Congress (TMC) to back their candidates. The BJD has nine members in the Rajya Sabha, while the TMC has 13. The name of TMC MP Sukhendu Shekhar Roy has also come up as candidate for united Opposition.
To break Opposition alliance, the BJP has also floated to support either the Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) of the Yuvajana Shramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP) of Andhra Pradesh. Sources said after debacle of BJP in Karnataka, it will try its best to salvage the pride by trying to win the election for deputy chairman.
Over past four years, the Rajya Sabha has been pain in the neck for the ruling party. For want of majority, it has not been able to push forwards it agenda, leading it to take the recourse of issuing ordinances or declaring legislations as money bills and thus circumventing the Rajya Sabha. The government, having an overwhelming majority in the directly elected Lok Sabha, came up with an idea of doing away with the Rajya Sabha. The ruling party had a sigh of relief, when it got its candidate M. Venkiah Naidu elected as vice-president, who also acts as ex-officio chairman of the Rajya Sabha. But since most of proceedings are presided by the deputy chairman, the ruling party is looking to anoint its candidate, to seek smooth passage of its agenda.
