Opposition leader Arjun Munda holds a demonstration in front of the Assembly. Picture by Prashant Mitra

Ranchi, March 4: If Union finance minister had an eye on the poll while presenting the Union budget, the Jharkhand legislators, too, played to the gallery today to keep their vote bank in tact.

So, when BJP member Ashok Kumar raked up the state government’s inaction over granting Bengali the second language status, several legislators having substantial number of Bangla-speaking voters in their constituency came out in his support.

Deputy chief minister Stephen Marandi, who had assured of following the Speaker’s ruling for granting Bengalithe second language status in the winter session, maintained that the issue needed to be decided by taking the House into confidence. He requested the Speaker to constitute an all-party committee of the House to discuss the fallout of such a decision.

The uproar from these members prompted the tribal brigade to make similar demands for the tribal languages. Congress MLA Sukhdeo Bhagat said states like Bengal and Maharashtra were reorganised in 1956 on the language basis. So, the tribal language should get its due in Jharkhand, he maintained.

In fact, the decision of the erstwhile Arjun Munda government on March 7, 2006 to give the official status to all those languages spoken by one per cent of the population i.e. around three lakh, has proved to be the Achilles’ heels for the Koda government.

“Judged by this yardstick, we will have to give the second language status to over a dozen languages. Such a decision will lead to a huge burden on the exchequer, as a big army of staff has to be appointed thereafter,” Marandi later told The Telegraph.

But then, that issues are raked up to grab media attention was obvious when Speaker Alamgir Alam wanted to restrict the number of questions to 15 during the zero hour. Twenty-nine questions were raised during the zero hour today.

HRD Minister Bandhu Tirkey informed the House that the process to appoint lecturers in Plus Two schools had been initiated, while chief Minister Madhu Koda announced holding a probe by the chief secretary into the alleged bungling in the construction of Sidho-Kanho Park in Dumka. Tirkey also assured the House of removing the bottlenecks in the renovation of Palamau fort.

Supplementary budget

The Madhu Koda-led government’s third supplementary budget was today passed in the assembly through voice vote.