Newly elected members of Rajasthan Assembly take oath

Jaipur: Newly elected members of the Rajasthan Legislative Assembly on Wednesday took oath on the first day of the two-day Assembly session.

The first session of the 16th Legislative Assembly began at 11 am. On the first day, 190 out of 199 members took oath.

Congress legislators had come to the House wearing black ribbons on arms in protest against the suspension of MPs in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha.

Elections on 199 out of 200 seats were held last month. Due to the demise of the Congress candidate, the election for the Karanpur seat was adjourned and will now be held on January 5.

Chief Minister Bhajanlal Sharma took the oath first, followed by Deputy CMs Diya Kumari and Prem Chand Bairwa.

While most of the members took oath in Hindi, some of them, including Zuber Khan (Congress) and Yoonus Khan (independent) took oath in Sanskrit.

A few legislators also expressed their desire to take oath in the Rajasthani language but Protem Speaker Kalicharan did not allow them saying that it was not included in the schedule eight of the Constitution.

The MLAs who were absent today will be administered oath on Thursday.

Election for the post of Speaker will also be held tomorrow. The BJP has already named Vasudev Devnani for the post of Speaker.

Soon after the House proceedings began, Congress MLA and former parliamentary affairs minister Shanti Dhariwal raised an objection over calling the session on a short notice.

After taking oath, Congress MLA and PCC chief Govind Singh Dotasra raised the issue of suspension of MPs in the Parliament, but the protem speaker did not allow him.

Bharat Adivasi Party (BAP) MLAs came to the House in traditional tribal attire while independent MLA Ritu Banawat reached the Assembly building by tractor and BJP MLA Jethanand Vyas came riding a motorcycle.

In the 16th legislative Assembly, BJP has 115 MLAs, Congress 69, BAP three, BSP two, Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) and Rashtriya Loktantrik Party (RLP) have one each, eight are independent while one seat is vacant.