In a rare happening, the landslide victory of BJP and unprecedented rout of Congress has rendered the nation’s Parliament without any Leader of Opposition called LoP. However, this is not for the first time. The House did not have a Leader of the Opposition in the first five Lok Sabha between 1952 and 1977. In 1952 elections, the CPI was the only other party in the Lok Sabha. The CPI held 16 seats in a House of 489, so it was not given the status of the main opposition party.
Congress had projected the name of Ghulam Nabi Azad for becoming LoP. However the Lok Sabha speaker Sumitra Mahajan refused to allow the Congress to have the post of the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha intimating that her decision was backed by Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi.
Historically, this ruling dates back to the first Lok Sabha where Mavalankar as its speaker had ruled that to get the LoP post in Lok Sabha, an opposition party has to secure a minimum of 10 per cent of the seats, that is, it must have a strength of 55 MPs. Rohatgi clarified in his opinion that Mavalankar had felt that the main opposition party’s numbers must equal the minimum quorum, which is 10 per cent of the total strength, required for functioning of the House. Congress at present has only 44 members out of the 543 seats in Lok Sabha thus short by 11 MPs to claim for a LoP appointment.
The office of the LoP is essentially required for framing and selection of various statutory bodies like the Lok Pal, Human Right Panel and Chief Vigilance Officer. In J and K the LoP from PDP did not endorse the appointment by abstaining and yet it had to be made.
Under the circumstances, the Union Government has decided to go ahead with the appointments in absence of any recognised LoP. There is no mandatory requirement of LoP in selection committee for appointing Vigillance Commissioner, Chairman NHRC and Lokpal. The appointments are normally made by the President on recommendation of selection committee headed by the Prime minister with Home Minister and LoP as members.
