BHUBANESWAR: AMID the social distancing protocol for Covid-19, the Odisha Assembly on Monday passed Appropriation Bill for 2020-21 allowing the State Government to spend over `1.55 lakh crore. Demand for grants of several departments had to be passed without any discussion as the House met only for an hour. The brief session of the Assembly was held at Convention Centre of Loka Seva Bhavan (Secretariat) as the Assembly staff were sent on home quarantine after the third Covid-19 positive patient was found to have come in contact with some employees of the facility.
This is for the first time in six decades that a session of the House has been held outside the Assembly building. The Appropriation Bill was moved by Finance Minister Niranjan Pujari while Leader of Opposition Pradipta Kumar Naik of BJP and Leader of Congress Legislature Party Narasingh Mishra supported it. Later, a senior BJD member told mediapersons that the Bill was passed unanimously. The annual Budget was placed in the House by the Finance Minister on February 18. Moving the Bill, Pujari sought support from all the members to fight Covid-19.
“We have, so far, been able to contain the spread of the disease by taking timely action,” he said and added that the fight against the deadly virus continues and therefore, everyone should support the State Government. “Apart from other developmental activities, the Government requires funds to tackle Covid-19,” he said. Journalists were not allowed inside the convention centre where the House assembled to pass the Appropriation Bill.
The centre was sanitised by employees of Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation before the sitting commenced. Following a request by Speaker SN Patro, only 30 per cent of 147 MLAs of the Assembly attended the session and members were allotted seats at two metre distance from each other to maintain social distancing. The Speaker had suspended Assembly proceedings from March 13 to 29 following the coronavirus outbreak. Around 50 MLAs including the Speaker, who attended the session were seen wearing masks and entered the House after washing their hands.