The Opposition on Wednesday raised objections over the extension of the Rajya Sabha session by a day without consensus and charged the Government with “bypassing” legislative scrutiny before introducing Bills. The Government, however, maintained the chair and the government has the right to extend the session. Proceedings were disrupted leading to two adjournments in the pre lunch session with several Opposition members including Congress raising slogans and storming into the well.
The ongoing winter session of the Upper House was to end on Tuesday but it was extended by a day to take up the Constitution (124th Amendment) Bill to provide 10 per cent reservation in government jobs and education for the economical backward candidates among the general category.
The Lok Sabha passed it on Tuesday while it was to come up the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday.
Protesting against the extension, the Opposition members said they were neither informed nor was their consent taken for the move. Besides Congress, the TMC and the AIADMK cited rule book to criticise the extension.
Deputy Chairman Harivansh said it may be considered his “personal lapse” and a “lapse in his understanding” in not conveying at the time of adjourning proceedings on Tuesday that the sitting of the House has been extended by a day.
Finance Minister and Leader of the House Arun Jaitley and Minister of State for parliamentary affairs Vijay Goel maintained that the Chair and the Government were within rights to extend the session to discuss important issues. The debate on quota bill resumed in the afternoon session after Minister for Social Justice Thaavarchand Gehlot introduced it in the morning but din led to two adjournments.
Earlier, raising the issue of extending the session when the House met for the day, Sukhendu Sekhar Roy (TMC) cited Rule 12 of Rajya Sabha to state that the sitting can be extended by the Chairman after making an announcement in the House and the change being published in the Rajya Sabha Bulletin.
He said there was no announcement, no notification and the Opposition on Tuesday protested against it adding a bulletin was published in the night for extension of the session.
Anand Sharma (Congress) said no decision on extending the sitting of the House was taken at the Business Advisory Committee (BAC) meeting and no time was allocated. Asserting that responsibility of running Parliament rests with the government, Sharma said it was for the first time there was no dialogue between the government and the opposition on that matter.
Sharma said it is the established practice in Rajya Sabha that no bill be brought without the scrutiny of parliamentary committees but this was not being followed. Sensitive bills are being brought bypassing “legislative scrutiny” by the present regime, he added. S R Balasubramoniyan (AIADMK) also obhjectedto the manner in which the session was extended.
Rejecting the Opposition objections, Goel said members should have been concerned about half of the 20 days of the session being washed out in pandemonium. He also said the decision to extend the House was first taken at the BAC meeting and then the Chairman holding an informal meeting with leaders of opposition parties.
However, the Congress and other Opposition members were not satisfied with the government’s response and stormed into the well. The Congress also demanded Home Minister Rajnath Singh’s statement on the Citizenship(Amendment) Bill 2019 and charged that it had led to unrest in the North-East.
