Enforcement Officer / Accounts Officer (EO/AO) 2020 recruitment test, advertisement 421. Transcribed from the Commission's own booklet (series A, NMJX-U-GTA); answer as per the official UPSC final answer key. This question is in Part B. Answer last reviewed 24 August 2026.

Who among the following Speakers of Lok Sabha formally disassociated from the political party after his election as the Speaker ?

(a)G.V. Mavalankar
(b)Sardar Hukam Singh
(c)Neelam Sanjiva Reddy
(d)P.A. Sangma

Answer

Why

Correct — C, (c) Neelam Sanjiva Reddy. Elected Speaker of the Fourth Lok Sabha on 17 March 1967, he resigned his membership of the Congress on taking the chair, to make plain that the office was above party. The gesture was borrowed from the British convention under which a member who becomes Speaker severs his party ties altogether and afterwards contests his seat, if at all, as 'the Speaker seeking re-election'. It is a striking step to have taken because Reddy came to the chair from the very centre of party politics: he had been Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh and President of the Indian National Congress in the early 1960s. He remained Speaker until July 1969, when he resigned the office to contest the presidential election, which he lost to V.V. Giri; he was elected Speaker a second time in March 1977, in the Sixth Lok Sabha, and left that chair too within months on being chosen as the presidential candidate, becoming President of India in July 1977, elected unopposed. The constitutional background is worth holding with the fact. The Speaker is elected by the Lok Sabha from among its members under Article 93; under Article 94 he vacates office if he ceases to be a member, may resign by writing to the Deputy Speaker, and may be removed by a resolution passed by a majority of all the then members of the House after fourteen days' notice, during the consideration of which he does not preside; under Article 100 he votes only in the case of an equality of votes. Indian practice, unlike British practice, does not require him to give up his party, and the Constitution accommodates the choice rather than compelling it: paragraph 5 of the Tenth Schedule exempts from disqualification for defection a member who gives up membership of his party on being elected Speaker and does not rejoin it while he holds the office. Reddy's step was therefore permitted, admired and not repeated as a rule — later Speakers have retained their party membership, and Om Birla, elected Speaker of the Seventeenth Lok Sabha in June 2019 and of the Eighteenth in June 2024, holds the office on the ordinary Indian footing.

Why the others are wrong

(a)G.V. Mavalankar — G.V. Mavalankar was the first Speaker of the Lok Sabha, from 1952 until his death in office in 1956, and had presided over the Central Legislative Assembly and then over the Constituent Assembly when it sat in its legislative capacity — a continuity that led Nehru to call him the father of the Lok Sabha. He established most of the conventions the office still runs on, and the Mavalankar rule on the minimum strength a party needs before its leader can be recognised as Leader of the Opposition carries his name. What he did not do is resign from the Congress; he remained a Congress member throughout, as every Speaker before Reddy and, as it turned out, after him has done. Being the first holder of an office and being the one who took a particular step in it are different claims, and this option relies on the two being confused.
(b)Sardar Hukam Singh — Sardar Hukam Singh was Speaker of the Third Lok Sabha from 1962 to 1967, the term immediately before Reddy's, having served as Deputy Speaker for the previous six years — the usual apprenticeship for the chair. He is remembered for chairing the parliamentary committee whose report preceded the reorganisation of Punjab in 1966, and he went on to be Governor of Rajasthan. He held his party membership while Speaker. The proximity of his term to Reddy's is what makes him a good distractor: a candidate who remembers that the episode belongs to the 1960s but not which Speaker it belongs to has a one-in-two chance between these two options, and the way to settle it is the date, 1967, which is where Hukam Singh's term ends and Reddy's begins.
(d)P.A. Sangma — P.A. Sangma was Speaker of the Eleventh Lok Sabha from 1996 to 1998, and is the only Speaker so far to have come from the North-East. He is the cleverest of the three distractors because he did leave a party — but afterwards, and for an unrelated reason. In 1999, a year after his term in the chair had ended, he left the Congress along with Sharad Pawar and Tariq Anwar over the question of the foreign origin of the party's leader, and the three founded the Nationalist Congress Party. That is a departure driven by a political disagreement, not a formal disassociation undertaken to protect the impartiality of the Speakership, which is what the question asks about. Sangma later served as a minister and as Speaker of the Meghalaya assembly, and contested the presidential election of 2012.

Concept

The Speaker is the presiding officer of the Lok Sabha and, in the constitutional theory of the office, its impartial servant rather than the majority's. He is elected by the House from among its members under Article 93; he decides points of order, interprets the rules of procedure, maintains order, certifies a Bill as a Money Bill under Article 110, presides over joint sittings of the two Houses under Article 108, adjourns the House or suspends a sitting for want of a quorum, appoints the chairmen of parliamentary committees and directs their work, and decides questions of disqualification for defection under the Tenth Schedule. His salary and allowances are charged on the Consolidated Fund of India, so they are not subject to the annual vote of the House, and he continues in office after the dissolution of the House until immediately before the first meeting of the next one. He votes only to break a tie. The tension at the heart of the office is that all this impartiality is asked of a person elected on a party ticket who will have to be re-elected on one. Britain resolved it by convention — the Speaker leaves his party and is not opposed at elections by the major parties. India did not adopt that convention, and the Tenth Schedule instead offers a protection to whoever chooses to follow it, by exempting from the defection law a Speaker who gives up his party membership on election and does not rejoin it while in office.

The polity questions in this paper are single-fact items on institutions and parliamentary machinery, and they reward knowing the office together with the people who have held it. This one sits at the junction of the two: the constitutional point is the impartiality of the chair, and the factual point is the one occasion on which a Speaker underlined it by giving up his party. It is also an item worth reading as a lesson in what a question is anchored to. The convention is British, the incident is from 1967, and the practice since has continued unchanged — so the answer would be the same whenever the paper had been set, while the name of the sitting Speaker would not.

Key facts

Neelam Sanjiva Reddy was elected Speaker of the Fourth Lok Sabha on 17 March 1967 and resigned from the Congress on taking office.
He resigned the Speakership in July 1969 to contest the presidential election, which he lost to V.V. Giri.
He had been Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh and President of the Indian National Congress before becoming Speaker.
He was elected Speaker again in March 1977 and became President of India in July 1977, elected unopposed.
Article 93 provides for the election of the Speaker and Deputy Speaker; Article 94 for vacation, resignation and removal, with fourteen days' notice required for a removal resolution.
Under Article 100 the Speaker has a casting vote only, exercised in the case of an equality of votes.
Paragraph 5 of the Tenth Schedule exempts from disqualification for defection a member who gives up his party membership on being elected Speaker and does not rejoin it while in office.
G.V. Mavalankar was the first Speaker of the Lok Sabha, 1952-1956; Sardar Hukam Singh held the office 1962-1967; P.A. Sangma held it 1996-1998.
Om Birla was elected Speaker of the Seventeenth Lok Sabha in June 2019 and of the Eighteenth Lok Sabha in June 2024.

A British convention that India admired, permitted, and did not adopt

Neelam Sanjiva Reddy→Elected Speaker of the Fourth Lok Sabha on 17 March 1967, he resigned his membership of the Congress on taking the chair, to make plain that the office was above party. The step is the more striking because he came to it from the very centre of party politics: he had been Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh and President of the Indian National Congress in the early 1960s. He resigned the Speakership in July 1969 to contest the presidential election, which he lost to V. V. Giri; he was elected Speaker again in March 1977 and became President of India in July 1977, elected unopposed.

The convention he was borrowing→In Britain a member who becomes Speaker severs his party ties altogether and afterwards contests his seat, if at all, as ‘the Speaker seeking re-election’. Indian practice does not require it, and the Constitution accommodates the choice rather than compelling it: paragraph 5 of the TENTH SCHEDULE exempts from disqualification for defection a member who gives up membership of his party on being elected Speaker and does not rejoin it while he holds the office. Reddy’s step was permitted, admired — and not made a rule.

G. V. Mavalankar→The first Speaker of the Lok Sabha, from 1952 until his death in office in 1956, who had presided over the Central Legislative Assembly and then over the Constituent Assembly when it sat in its legislative capacity — a continuity that led Nehru to call him the father of the Lok Sabha. He established most of the conventions the office still runs on.

Sardar Hukam Singh→Speaker of the Third Lok Sabha, 1962 to 1967 — the term immediately before Reddy’s — having served as Deputy Speaker for the previous six years, the usual apprenticeship for the chair. He chaired the parliamentary committee whose report preceded the reorganisation of Punjab in 1966, and went on to be Governor of Rajasthan. He held his party membership while Speaker.

P. A. Sangma — the cleverest of the distractors→Speaker of the Eleventh Lok Sabha, 1996 to 1998, and the only Speaker so far to have come from the North-East. He did leave a party — but afterwards, and for an unrelated reason: in 1999, a year after his term in the chair had ended, he left the Congress along with Sharad Pawar and Tariq Anwar over the question of the foreign origin of the party’s leader.

Study next

Powers and functions of the Speaker, including certification of Money Bills under Article 110 and joint sittings under Article 108The Tenth Schedule: grounds of disqualification, the Speaker's role in deciding it, and the exemptions in paragraphs 4 and 5The Deputy Speaker, the panel of chairpersons, and the Speaker pro temParliamentary committees and the Speaker's part in constituting themThe list of Speakers of the Lok Sabha with their terms, which is asked directly in these papers

Common traps

Confusing leaving a party later with disassociating from it on election as Speaker. P.A. Sangma did the first, not the second.
Assuming the first holder of an office is the answer to any question about a first step taken in it.
Believing Indian Speakers are required to give up party membership. They are not; the Tenth Schedule merely protects the one who does.
Forgetting that Reddy held the office twice, in 1967 and again in 1977, and left it on both occasions for the presidential election.
Mixing up the neighbouring terms of Hukam Singh and Reddy; 1967 is the dividing line.

Parliamentary questions in EPFO EO/AO papers combine an institution with a name — who held an office at a particular moment, who did something first, which body has which mandate — so the preparation that pays is a short table of office-holders alongside the constitutional articles. The Speaker, the Deputy Speaker, the Rajya Sabha Chairman and the presiding officers' powers recur across papers.

Related PYQs

EPFO_EOAO_2020_Q37Open & attempt →

Which one of the following is the mandate of the Committee on Estimates ?

(a) It reports on what economies, improvements in organization, efficiency or administrative reform consistent with the policy underlying the estimates, may be effected.
(b) It scrutinizes appropriation and finance accounts of the Government.
(c) It examines reports of the Comptroller and Auditor General and whether public undertakings are run efficiently.
(d) It examines bills on matters of general public interest.

Answer(a) It reports on what economies, improvements in organization, efficiency or administrative reform consistent with the policy underlying the estimates, may be effected.

The paper's other item on parliamentary machinery, asking what the Committee on Estimates is mandated to do. It connects directly to this one through the Speaker's own functions: the members of the Estimates Committee are elected annually by the Lok Sabha and its chairman is appointed by the Speaker from among them, so the financial committees of Parliament are part of what the impartiality of the chair is meant to protect.

Practice

practice — not a real PYQ
Under the Tenth Schedule to the Constitution of India, a member who voluntarily gives up membership of his political party on being elected Speaker of the Lok Sabha, and does not rejoin it while holding that office, is treated in which one of the following ways ?
- (a)He is disqualified on the ground of defection
- (b)He is exempt from disqualification on the ground of defection
- (c)He is required to resign his seat in the House
- (d)He forfeits his right to a casting vote
Answer(b) He is exempt from disqualification on the ground of defection
practice — not a real PYQ
Who among the following was the first Speaker of the Lok Sabha ?
- (a)G.V. Mavalankar
- (b)M. Ananthasayanam Ayyangar
- (c)Sardar Hukam Singh
- (d)Neelam Sanjiva Reddy
Answer(a) G.V. Mavalankar

Why