Assam assembly scraps Friday namaz break – Times of India

Currently, when the assembly is in session, on most working days, the House assembles at 9.30 am and sits till 1.30-2.00 pm without a break. However, on Fridays, the assembly proceedings are paused from 11:30am to 1:00, a practice that has been followed since the creation of the state legislature in 1937. The assembly resumes its proceedings in the post-lunch session.
Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma wrote on X that the rule of adjourning the House every Friday “for Jumme” has been abolished “in order to increase the productivity of the Assam legislative assembly and to remove the colonial burden from the state”.
“This practice was started by Syed Saadullah of the Muslim League in 1937,” he wrote as he thanked Daimary and legislators “for this effort to maintain the ancient secular values of India”.

The proposal to remove this rule from the Rules of Procedure of the assembly was placed before the rules committee headed by the speaker, which unanimously agreed to drop the rule.
An official statement said that on all other days, the House used to conduct its proceedings “without any such adjournment for religious purposes”, which was taken note of by speaker Daimary. “In view of the secular nature of the Constitution, he proposed that the Assam legislative assembly must conduct its proceedings on Fridays like any other day without any adjournment to facilitate Muslim members to go for namaz,” the statement added.

“Accordingly, today, the House adopted a motion to amend this rule so as to provide for sitting of the House for conduct of its proceedings on Fridays like any other day. So, today history has been created by doing away with this colonial practice which was aimed at dividing the society on religious basis.”