By IANS,
New Delhi : The Lok Sabha secretariat Saturday notified a special session for July 21 when the Congress led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) would face the trust vote in the house. While the voting is likely to take place July 22, it would be preceded by a debate over the motion seeking trust of the house July 21.
The special 14th session of the house was necessitated in the wake of the Left Front withdrawing support to the Manmohan Singh government over the India-US deal for civil nuclear cooperation.
“The fourteenth session of the fourteenth Lok Sabha will commence Monday, 21st July 2008. Subject to exigencies of the government business, the session is likely to conclude Tuesday, 22nd July 2008,” said an official communiqué issued Saturday by the Lok Sabha secretariat.
The decision to call a special session of the Lok Sabha had been taken Friday at the meeting of cabinet committee on political affairs (CCPA) presided over by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Allies of the Congress in the UPA met Friday morning at Manmohan Singh’s residence and expressed confidence that the government would survive the trust vote.
The UPA is confident of proving its numbers in the Lok Sabha.
“We have enough numbers to prove majority. We already have over 280 members (which is eight more than the half-way mark 272 in the Lok Sabha) and we are trying to convince more members,” Parliamentary Affairs Minister Vyalar Ravi said Friday.
Congress sources claimed that apart from the 236 MPs in the UPA, it will get the support of 37 Samajwadi Party members, a few independents, two of the three Janata Dal-Secular MPs and its estranged ally Telangana Rashtra Samiti’s three members.
The government was reduced to a minority after 61 MPs of the Communist Party of India-Marxist-led Left bloc and an allied party withdrew their support Wednesday after four years.