Congress leader and Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi today said with expectation that the voice of the Opposition will be allowed to be represented in the Parliament. He assured full cooperation to the Speaker to run the House “often and well”.
In his welcome speech congratulating the newly elected Speaker Om Birla, Gandhi said amidst thumping of desks from Opposition benches, “of course, the government has political power, but the Opposition also represents the voice of India’s people and this time, the Opposition represents significantly more voice of the Indian people than it did last time”.
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Cautioning against stifling or silencing the voice of the Opposition, Rahul Gandhi said, “the idea that you can run the House efficiently by silencing the voice of the Opposition is a non-democratic idea and this election has shown that the people of India expect the Opposition to defend the Constitution, the Samvidhan of this country”.
“The question is not how efficiently the House is run, the question is how much of India’s voice is being allowed to be heard in this House”, he observed, while expressing confidence that “by allowing the Opposition to speak, by allowing us to represent the people of India, you will do your duty of defending the Constitution of India”.
Assuring the support and cooperation of the Opposition to run the house, the Leader of the Opposition told the Speaker, “the Opposition would like to assist you in doing your work. We would like the House to function often and well”.
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At the same time, Gandhi added, it is very important that cooperation is on the basis of trust. “It is very important that the voice of the Opposition is allowed to be represented in this House”, he observed, adding, “I am confident that you will allow us to represent our voice, allow us to speak, allow us to represent the voice of the people of India”.
