The contest will be between the BJP’s Om Birla, three-time MP from Rajasthan’s Kota and the Speaker in the last Lok Sabha and Congress’s eight-term MP from Kerala’s Mavelikara, K Suresh. The BJP is seen to have picked Mr Birla to reinforce the message of continuity.
The Speaker is elected by simple majority taking into account the number of MPs present and voting. Seven MPs – five from the Opposition and two Independents – have not taken oath and cannot vote, sources have said.  
While the Opposition has 232 seats, the NDA has 293 MPs. It is also expected to have the support of the four MPs of YS Jaganmohan Reddy’s YSR Congress.
Stage was set for the election on Tuesday, as the Congress made a snap decision to field K Suresh just 10 minutes ahead of the noon deadline.
Its decision was fuelled by the BJP brush off for its hopes for the Pro Tem Speaker and the Deputy Speaker posts. The party had initially expected Mr Suresh to get the post of the Pro Tem Speaker, which finally went to the BJP’s Bhartruhari Mahtab.
On Tuesday morning, the government, while seeking consensus for Om Birla, made it clear that they are not considering a Deputy Speaker post, or the Opposition’s claim to it, for now.
Congress’s Rahul Gandhi said, “Rajnath Singh called Mallikarjun Kharge and asked him to extend support… entire Opposition said we will support but convention is Deputy Speaker should be from our side. Rajnath Singh said he would call back… but he has not yet…PM is asking for cooperation but our leader is getting insulted.”
Tuesday evening passed in parallel meetings at both camps. While Union Home Minister Amit Shah met the NDA allies, the Opposition Bloc had their meeting at Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge’s house.
Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress has signalled that it did not approve the decision to force a contest. Regarding support for K Suresh, it will convey its decision by 9 am, the party has said.  
Union minister Kiren Rijiju has issued a last appeal for a consensus candidate.  “For the last two days, we have been in contact with main Opposition parties, talked to their floor leaders regarding the post of Speaker… We want the Speaker to be elected unopposed and through consensus,” he said. 

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was freed by a court on the US Pacific island territory of Saipan on Wednesday after pleading guilty to violating US espionage law, in a deal that will see him return home to Australia.

During the three-hour hearing, Assange pled guilty to one criminal count of conspiring to obtain and disclose classified U.S. national defence documents but said he had believed the Constitution’s First Amendment, which protects free speech, shielded his activities.

“Working as a journalist I encouraged my source to provide information that was said to be classified in order to publish that information,” he told the court.

“I believed the First Amendment protected that activity but I accept that it was … a violation of the espionage statute.”

Chief U.S. District Judge Ramona V. Manglona accepted his guilty plea and released him due to time already served in a British jail.

Assange, 52, has left Saipan on a private jet accompanied by Australia’s ambassadors to the US and UK, according to flight logs. They will then travel to Canberra, landing just before 7 pm (0900 GMT).

Assange had agreed to plead guilty to a single criminal count, according to filings in the U.S. District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands.

The U.S. territory in the western Pacific was chosen due to his opposition to travelling to the mainland U.S. and for its proximity to Australia, prosecutors said.

Dozens of media from around the world attended the hearing, with more gathered outside the courtroom to cover the proceedings. Media were not allowed inside the courtroom to film the hearing.

“I watch this and think how overloaded his senses must be, walking through the press scrum after years of sensory depravation and the four walls of his high-security Belmarsh prison cell,” Stella Assange, the wife of WikiLeaks founder said on social media platform X.

LONG SAGA

Australian-born Assange spent more than five years in a British high-security jail and seven holed up in the Ecuadorean embassy in London as he fought accusations of sex crimes in Sweden and battled extradition to the U.S., where he faced 18 criminal charges.

Assange’s supporters view him as a victim because he exposed U.S. wrongdoing and potential crimes, including in conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq. Washington has said the release of the secret documents put lives in danger.

The Australian government has been advocating for his release and has raised the issue with the United States several times.

“This isn’t something that has happened in the last 24 hours,” Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told a news conference on Wednesday.

“This is something that has been considered, patient, worked through in a calibrated way, which is how Australia conducts ourselves.”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

In Oklahoma, a tragic incident occurred when 59-year-old Indian-American motel manager Hemant Mistry, originally from Gujarat, was fatally punched by a man identified as Richard Lewis. The assault happened in the motel’s parking lot near Interstate 40 and Meridian Avenue on Saturday night, after Mistry requested Lewis to leave the property. Police were called to the scene around 10 PM.