Lucknow , Oct 18 (UNI) Amid boycott by Congress and BSP members, polling process for election of the Deputy Speaker of Uttar Pradesh assembly commenced at 1200 hours on Monday.

The principal opposition , Samajwadi Party members created ruckus of their demand to give the post to the opposition as per democratic norms.

Speaker Hridya Narain Dikshit rejected the demand of the SP members for a 2 minutes speech each by both the candidates.

Rebel SP candidate Nitin Agarwal , supported by the ruling BJP is pitted against SP candidate Narendra Singh Verma for the post.

Voting commenced inside the assembly at 1200 hours and will continue till 1500 hours and thereafter the results would be declared following counting of votes, speaker announced.

Earlier there was a heated debate between leader of the opposition Ram Govind Choudhury and state parliamentary affairs minister Suresh Kumar Khanna on the process adopted for the election of the deputy speaker.

Mr Choudhury slammed the government over the authenticity of this elections just a few months before the elections. " It is a black day in the history of the UP assembly as the elections were announced without taking opposition into confidence," he said.

Giving an example ,the SP leader said in the past Mulayam Singh Yadav had given the deputy speaker post to the opposition BJP's Rajesh Agarwal during 2004-2007 tenure presenting a traditional norm.

However Parliamentary affairs minister Suresh Kumar Khanna ridiculed the statement of the opposition leader claiming that during 2007-12 ,BSP regime and again during 2012-2017 in SP regime there was no election for deputy speaker post. But BJP maintaining democratic norms was holding this elections.

" As SP leadership could not decide the name of the candidate hence we decided to support Nitin Agarwal, who is also of SP, so why there is so much protest," Mr Khanna questioned.
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