A few Opposition parties, including the Trinamool Congress, the BRS, and the AIADMK, may skip the all-party meeting convened by the Centre on Friday in view of the Winter Session of Parliament, which is scheduled to begin on Monday. The government has convened the customary meeting of floor leaders of political parties in the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha on Saturday.
Sources say that the Opposition parties have also convened a meeting of members of the INDIA bloc coalition on Monday before the Session begins. The meeting has been called to prepare a strategy for the Winter Session against the backdrop of intense friction over a range of issues, including targets by Central probe agencies on Opposition leaders. The Opposition meeting will be chaired by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, who is also the Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha.
Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pralhad Joshi will conduct the meeting, which is expected to be attended by senior party leaders, including Union Ministers Nirmala Sitharaman, Nitin Gadkari, Rajnath Singh, and Piyush Goyal, who is also the Leader of the House in the Rajya Sabha.
Sources said while Telangana Chief Minister led Bharatiya Rashtra Samiti (BRS) will go unrepresented as acrimonious exchange of words have been there between the BRS and the BJP in the just concluded election campaign in the State, the AIADMK too is likely to give a miss over verbal duel between the BJP leadership of Tamil Nadu and AIADMK which till last month was the largest and longest serving alliance partner of BJP in the NDA from southern India.
Another major Opposition party that is certain to avoid participating in the all-party meeting is the TMC led by West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee. The party believes that its Parliament representatives, such as Mahua Moitra and Abhishek Banerjee, are being victimised by the Centre. Abhishek, who is Mamata’s nephew, is facing a probe by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), while Moitra has been implicated by the Parliament Ethics Committee over allegations of cash-for-query in the Lok Sabha question hour. While the party has defended Moitra, she now faces a probe by the CBI and the IT Ministry for sharing her Parliament login details beyond her jurisdiction.
Sources said the report of the Ethics Committee on the “cash-for-query” allegations against Moitra will be tabled in Lok Sabha during the Session.
The House will have to adopt the report before the expulsion recommended by the panel comes into effect and in all likelihood the TMC firebrand leader who has been attacking industrialist Adani Group will be disqualified from the lower house this session.
Sources in other political parties like Congress, JDU, Shiv Sena, NCP, AAP, Shiromani Akali Dal, RJD, BJD amongst others will be attending the meeting.
The Winter session of Parliament begins on December 4 and will have 15 sittings till December 22, during which it is expected to consider key draft legislations, including three bills to replace the colonial era criminal laws.
As of now 37 Bills are pending in Parliament of which 12 are listed for consideration and passing, and seven Bills for introduction, consideration and passing.
Sources said the government also plans to present the first batch of Supplementary Demands for Grants for the year 2023-24.
Also, the three key bills which seek to replace the Indian Penal Code, Code of Criminal Procedure and the Evidence Act are likely to be taken up for consideration during the session as the standing committee on Home has already adopted the three reports recently.
Another key bill pending in Parliament relates to the appointment of the chief election commissioner and election commissioners.
Introduced in the Monsoon session, the government had not pushed for its passage in the special session of Parliament amid protests from the opposition and former chief election commissioners as it seeks to bring on a par the status of the CEC and ECs with that of the cabinet secretary. At present, they enjoy the status of a Supreme Court judge.
