Members heap encomiums on Speaker

NEW DELHI: The entire Lok Sabha on Friday congratulated Speaker Manohar Joshi on completion of one year in office, saying he had steered the House through difficult situations and always kept the interest of the Opposition in mind.
Responding to felicitations, Joshi said in the House it was "very embarrassing for him to hear such laudatory remarks and maintained that it would not be proper to devote too much to the discussion."
Joshi said during his tenure, the House had passed nearly 100 Bills and the Winter Session had broken a three-decade-old record by adopting 37 Bills.
The Speaker hoped the controversial Women''s Reservation Bill, which has been alluding consensus for the last couple of years, would be passed by the 13th Lok Sabha.
Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said Joshi had dispelled doubts among MPs by his sterling performance as the presiding officer and had given no scope for the Opposition to complain.
Among others who complemented the Speaker for upholding the norms of parliamentary democracy were former Prime Minister Chandrashekhar, Mulayam Singh Yadav (Samajwadi Party), Somnath Chatterjee (CPI-M), Ram Vilas Paswan (Lok Janshakti), Vilas Muttemwar, Renuka Chowdhary and Sriprakash Jaiswal (all Congress), Rashid Alvi (BSP), S S Palanimanickam (DMK), V Saroja (AIADMK) Suresh Jadhav (Shiv Sena) and Raghuvansh Prasad Singh (RJD).