Gujarat Assembly Speaker reprimands AAP’s Italia: ‘Urge him to take sufficient care’

Members should take this matter seriously so that House will not have to take disciplinary action in future, says Chaudhary
Speaker Shankar Chaudhary on Monday issued an official reprimand to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA Gopal Italia for “speaking about matters pending discussion in the Gujarat Legislative Assembly, outside the House”.

“I reprimand Member of the House Gopalbhai Italia and also urge him to take sufficient care in this matter in the future,” Chaudhary said while reading out his decision, five days after Italia made the remarks.

Earlier, he reserved his decision on the point of order stating “I think I will have to give an elaborate decision on this.”
This comes after a heated exchange of words between members of the Opposition and the ruling BJP over a Point of Order raised by Agriculture Minister Jitu Vaghani on March 11, alleging breach of privilege by AAP MLA Gopal Italia.

Vaghani alleged that Italia had committed breach of privilege by speaking to mediapersons about a starred question that was not discussed in the House on March 10.

Italia defended himself by saying that there cannot be a ban on making political observations outside the House and the replies given by the government in the Assembly become public property, as anyone can access these through NeVA (National e-Vidhan Application).

Reading out his decision, Chaudhary said, “On February 24, 2026, I announced a decision in the House that any issue which is not discussed in the House, documents or papers that are not tabled in the House, that issue cannot be made public.

The legislators should refrain from construing the discussion happening in the House or presenting incomplete information and from misinterpreting and disseminating information contrary to the facts.”
“The members should take this matter very seriously so that in the future, the House will not have to take any disciplinary action.

The documents which are not discussed in the House but are placed on the table of the House, such as unstarred questions, reports placed on the table of the House, etc, which are considered public documents after being placed on the table of the House, cannot be made public in any way, whether in a fair or imaginary way, but only to the extent that they are mentioned in the actual documents,” he added.

Requesting all the members of the House, both the ruling party and the opposition members to exercise the special rights given to them by the Constitution, the Speaker added hat public representatives should refrain from any behavior that would adversely affect the Constitution.

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