The ruling alliance BJP-IPFT on the first day of Tripura legislative assembly will have to face the first test of their second government on March 24 to elect the Speaker of the House, as oppositions CPI (M), Congress and Tipra-Motha will jointly contest the elections.

Announcing this significant decision over the poll tactic of opposition parties, Pradesh Congress president Birajit Sinha on Monday addressing a press conference at Congress Bhavan said that the opposition CPI (M), Congress and ‘Tipra Motha’ have already agreed to put up candidate Speaker post and Senior Congress leader and newly elected MLA from 9-Banamalipur assembly constituency Gopal Chandra Roy will file his nomination paper on March 23 next, which will be proposed by CPI(M) and Tipra-Motha.

The notification for election to the post of speaker has already been issued and this will take place on the opening day of the 13th state assembly on March 24 and the second notification for election to the post of deputy speaker will be issued thereafter.

As per the notification, the submission of nomination papers will be held on March 23 before 1 PM and the withdrawal of nomination papers has a fixed period of 3 PM on the same day. The election will be held on March 24 and will start from 11 AM.

While, Birajit Sinha said that all three opposition parties after discussion had taken the unanimous decision of contesting the speaker election and all were agreed to support senior Congress’s legislator Gopal Chandra Roy as Speaker candidate from Congress, CPI(M) and Tipra-Motha.

He also gave a clear indication that the matter of deputy speaker’s election will be decided later on but the CPI (M) and Congress have agreed to support and vote for a candidate from Tipra Motha as deputy speaker.

He added that the matter of deputy speaker will be resolved later after discussion among the leaders of three parties as no notification has as yet been issued by Tripura Assembly .

Sinha also said that in the nomination paper for Gopal Roy, the CPI(M) state secretary and MLA from Sabroom seat Jitendra Chaudhury will sign as first proposer and the signature of the second proposer will be signed by any Tipra-Motha MLA.

It may be recalled here that the present strength of Tripura assembly is 59 MLAs after the resignation of the MLA of Dhanpur assembly constituency, Pratima Bhoumik. The ruling alliance  has 32 MLAs including one from IPFT, while the oppositions Tipra-Motha have 13 MLAs, CPI(M) have 11 MLAs and Congress have 3 legislators.

In the house the ruling BJP should have no problem in winning the elections to both the posts of Speaker and deputy speaker as they have absolute majority in the 59 members House.