Bihar political crisis: Speaker tests positive for Covid but recovers in a day

A day after he tested positive for Covid-19, Bihar Assembly Speaker Vijay Kumar Sinha said his test reports have come out negative.

His Covid-19 claim comes amid brewing political storm in Bihar, where he will play a key role in determining the legitimacy of any new formulation.

Sinha, a BJP MLA, ebulliently announced on Twitter that his test reports on Monday were negative. A day earlier, he had tested positive.

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Many took to the micro-blogging site to express astonishment at the speed with which the Speaker was declared Covid negative, and the fact that the health portfolio is also held by BJP’s Mangal Pandey.

On Monday night, members of the Ethics Committee of the assembly, headed by another BJP leader Ram Narayan Mandal, met Sinha and submitted a report.

While Mandal declined to divulge details, citing confidentiality, sources in the party said the report was about an incident of March last year when opposition RJD MLAs had held the Speaker hostage inside his chair and police was called in.

The sources said the report indicts about 18 MLAs, whose names were not known.