It is learnt from sources privy to the Chief Minister’s office that the first Budget Session for the year 2017-18 of the present Assembly would be convened in June. It would be again the first Budget of the Trivendra Singh Rawat-led Bharatiya Janata Party Government. The schedule of the session might be fixed during the Cabinet meeting slated to be held on the fourth Wednesday of this month.
Talking to The Pioneer, the State Parliamentary Affairs Minister Prakash Pant said that they would definitely convene the Budget Session soon. “The Cabinet would decide the time and the venue of the session at the appropriate time,” he said, while keeping the option open of holding the maiden Budget Session under the present regime at Gairsain in Chamoli district, a practice started and continued during the previous Congress-helmed regime.
Notably, the Trivendra Singh Rawat Government, formed on March 18, had gone for a vote on account to clear the governmental expenses for the next four months till July. The Government sources had said then that the time being limited for presenting a full-fledged budget in sync with the ruling party’s vision document- unveiled by the Union finance minister Arun Jaitley in the thick of campaigning-, passing a vote on account was an imperative. “The state government is now taking pains to present its maiden budget. It would embody the dream the Trivendra Singh Rawat government nurtures in building a new Uttarakhand,” said a senior cabinet minister.
Mention worthy, then Harish Rawat led Government had had a resolution passed during the two-day Assembly session held in November 2016 at the newly constructed Assembly building at Gairsain that the next budget session would be convened at Gairsain by the new state government. Things viewed against this backdrop,Trivendra Singh Rawat government seems to be in a fix.
Though BJP as the main opposition party raised harangues over the Congress-helmed government then, slamming the latter for taking the people for a ride on the emotive issue of the capital shift, now the same party running the government can hardly go against the resolution passed by the previous government.
Another interesting feature of the upcoming Assembly session would be the passage of the two crucial bills related to the transfer and the appointment of the lokayukta. During the last session, these two bills had been sent to select committee as the Opposition Congress had demanded so, citing the two bills poised to affect the future of the State.