Jharkhand Assembly Speaker Rabindra Nath Mahato on Thursday convened an all-party meeting to ensure the smooth functioning of the House during the upcoming winter session.
The session will begin on Friday and conclude on December 11, with five working days scheduled.
"The second supplementary budget for the 2025–26 fiscal will be tabled during the session, and a discussion on it will also be held," he said.
Chief Minister Hemant Soren, Leader of Opposition and BJP president Babulal Marandi, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Radhakrishna Kishore and other leaders attended the meeting.
Kishore said the Leader of Opposition had requested an extension of the time allotted for the debate on the second supplementary budget, which was accepted. He added that co-operation from members of both the ruling and opposition benches was expected to ensure the session proceeds smoothly and proves productive in the interest of the people of the state.
Speculations are rife in Ranchi over the "strained" ties between alliance partners JMM, RJD and Congress, and Chief Minister Hemant Soren's Delhi visits. Soren and his legislator-wife Kalpana Soren are spending long periods in the national capital and their purported meetings with BJP leaders. Both returned on Wednesday evening, days ahead of the winter session of the Assembly beginning December 5.
However, both the JMM and Congress have rubbished the claims of a possible shake-up and termed such claims as rumours.
Jharkhand Congress leader and state Finance Minister Radhakrishna Kishore also said there is no truth in this matter.
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"INDIA bloc has 56 seats. Not getting a seat in Bihar elections is too trivial; we are reviewing it," he said, rejecting claims that fiscal distress was driving the need for political realignment.
Another Congress legislator and Minister Dipika Padney Singh said, "The speculations are absolutely wrong. BJP is trying to spread rumours. The CM preferred to go to jail rather than bow before the BJP. The state's people gave a strong and one-sided mandate to the alliance, which is going to govern the state with firmness."
With 34 MLAs, the JMM is seven short of a majority. The Congress has 16 MLAs, and it is being speculated that some might switch sides as part of a "Congress-minus, BJP-supported" government led by Soren, though such a scenario would require at least 11 Congress MLAs to defect to avoid disqualification.
Many JMM leaders have rejected this possibility outright, calling it speculations allegedly spread by the BJP.
