After the national election face-off in April-May, battle-lines have been drawn between India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and opposition parties once again over the pace with which the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi is pushing through key legislations in the ongoing session of parliament.
Parliament has already passed a dozen bills—reportedly the highest number in 15 years--and is likely to considering at least ten more and the BJP is planning to extend parliamentary session from July 26 to August 10.
Even though the new Lok Sabha has been constituted after the elections, the new parliamentary standing committees are yet to be set up. In the absence of the committees and a much weakened opposition, the government is keen to pass as many bills as possible after short debates.
The BJP has a commanding majority in the Lok Sabha and has no difficulty in having the bills passed. But it is in the Rajya Sabha, the upper House, where the opposition enjoys numerical advantage and can block the bills’ final parliamentary approval.
Most of the opposition parties allege the government is pushing through the bills using its brute majority in the Lok Sabha without adequate time for amendments and debate.
It remains to be seen if the opposition would
once again scuttle the key bills in the Rajya
Sabha if its demand for referring them to
parliamentary committees is not
accepted by the government.
The opposition has identified seven bills which they want to send them to either standing or select committees for greater legislative oversight before they are taken up by parliament. Among the bills the opposition wants to be referred to these committees is the one that envisages criminalization of instant triple talaq (talaq-e-biddat), another related to changes in the Right to Information (RTI) Act and yet another on changes made (and passed by the Lok Sabha) in India’s anti-terror law. The opposition has several reservations about the changes the government wants in these laws through these bills.
The changes in the RTI Act, okayed by the Lok Sabha a few days ago, have drawn the ire of the opposition, including UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi, and former Chief Information Commissioners who claim the law has been sought to be diluted by the amendments moved by the government.
The opposition wants the RTI Amendment Bill, 2019 , the amendment bill concerning the anti-terror law and the Muslim Women (Rights of Protection of Marriage) bill, 2019 to be subjected to standing committee or select committee scrutiny.
The government’s rush to push through the bills has had the effect of uniting the fragmented opposition on the issue. Sonia Gandhi met leaders of other opposition parties on Wednesday and a separate meeting was held between senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad and leaders of Samajwadi Party and Trinamool Congress. The objective of the two meetings was to explore the possibility of a common opposition strategy over the bills in parliament.
Azad said the important bills should be sent to parliamentary committees. “If the government does not accept the demand, then what is the point in attending parliament? he said.
On the other hand, the BJP maintains that the bills were being debated in detail in parliament for which the House sat late hours. The party also points that in the past, the opposition with majority in the Rajya Sabha had resisted several bills passed by the Lok Sabha.
The government is also under some pressure to pass the bills to turn a number of ordinances promulgated in February and March into parliamentary laws.
It remains to be seen if the opposition would once again scuttle the key bills in the Rajya Sabha if its demand for referring them to parliamentary committees is not accepted by the government.
Pallab Bhattacharya is a journalist based in India.