New Delhi | Delhi Assembly Speaker Vijender Gupta on Thursday ruled that any member marshalled out or suspended would not be able to enter the House premises.
Gupta gave his ruling on the issue of 21 AAP MLAs' three-day suspension for raising slogans during Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena's first address to the newly-constituted eighth Delhi Assembly on Tuesday.
AAP MLA Amanatullah Khan raised the issue and urged the speaker to call the suspended members back.
Being absent from the House during Saxena's address, the Okhla MLA was the lone AAP member to escape suspension.
Issuing a clarification, Gupta said "House" meant the entire premises of the Delhi Assembly, according to the rulebook.
"Precincts of the House means the assembly hall, lobbies, galleries, rooms in the occupation of the Assembly Secretariat, speaker's room, deputy speaker's room, committee room, assembly library, reading room, party rooms, all accommodation in the charge of officers of the Assembly Secretariat and approaches leading thereto, and also such other places as the speaker may from time to time specify," he said, citing the rulebook.
The Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Legislative Assembly of the National Capital Territory of Delhi, 1997, says members suspended from the House stand debarred from entering the precinct.
If any member is marshalled out of the House, the rulebook says he will go out of the (assembly) premises, Gupta said.
"Let me clear it for all the members, whenever such a situation is arrived at, the entire assembly premises is a part of the House," he added.
In his reply, Khan said such things never happened when AAP was in government.
"All our MLAs are sitting outside the gate. You could have permitted them to come inside. The people have elected you to work. The enmity should not be such that you do not let us enter the assembly premises," he said.
The speaker, however, said the action of the AAP MLAs during Saxena's address was "absolutely condemnable" and such incidents happened only a few times in the history of India.
He also congratulated the House for its decision.
"A balanced approach was maintained in the decision against such a serious offence with only three days (of suspension). The punishments prescribed by the rulebook are heavier than this," he said.
The lieutenant governor's address is meant for Delhi, it is not for any party, Gupta said.
Khan urged the speaker to call back the opposition MLAs, citing past instances when BJP legislators were marshalled out during the AAP regime and then allowed back at the request of their colleagues.
He also pointed out that the absence of opposition members during the deputy speaker's election would not be proper.
BJP MLA Mohan Singh Bisht was elected deputy speaker with no opposition MLA present.
The suspended AAP MLAs held a protest outside the assembly, where they were stopped by police. Their suspension ends on Friday.
