Oppn members given ample time in Assembly: Speaker

Uttar Pradesh Assembly Speaker Hriday Narayan Dixit said today that opposition members were given ample time in the House to raise their issues during the recent budget session.
"I have come to know about the opposition's allegation that they boycotted the assembly proceedings as they were not given ample time. It's not true. The opposition members were given enough time to put forth their views," Dixit told reporters here.
Referring to the UP Assembly budget session, Dixit said the House ran for 11 days and on five of these, the opposition was not present.
"Though the opposition strength is 18.62 per cent (with 75 members), around 36 per cent of those who spoke in the House were from the opposition. Of the total 95 members, who spoke in the House, 27 were from opposition," he said.

I have tried to give more time to first time legislators, the Speaker said.
Asked about the opposition's allegation that the microphone of the Leader of Opposition was switched off, Dixit said "it is the tradition that when Speaker moves to another item in the the agenda, the microphone is switched off. As members of both the opposition and the ruling sides had entered into arguments, I had moved to another item".
On suspected explosive material being recovered inside the House, Dixit said that House had recommended an NIA probe into it.