Somnath Chatterjee

NEW DELHI: Hurt at being branded “dictatorial” and expressing sorrow over unending disruptions of the house, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee on Dec. 16 stunned Parliament by offering to resign.

MOTHER TERESA MEMORIAL STREET: Traffic on the newly-named Mother Teresa Sarani (Mother Teresa memorial street), in Kolkata on Dec. 12, where a bronze bust of Mother Teresa was installed. The renaming of the city’s landmark Park Street, and inauguration of the statue took place on Dec. 11. (Photo: AFP)

“I have been accused of indulging in tanashahi (dictatorship). The chair does not have any prestige any longer and has become totally irrelevant and it has become a matter of agony for me to occupy this chair, which I never expected to do, far less solicited,” the 73-year-old parliamentary veteran said in a statement in the lower house.

A member of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), Chatterjee became India’s first communist speaker on June 4 with bipartisan support.