Parliament on Monday passed amendments to the Motor Vehicles Act as well as the National Medical Commission (NMC) Bill after Lok Sabha approved minor changes made by Rajya Sabha. On August 1, Rajya Sabha cleared the National Medical Commission Bill for replacing the Medical Council of India (MCI) with a new body. The Bill was already passed by Lok Sabha but since the Upper House made two amendments it came back to Lok Sabha.
Health and Family Welfare Minister Harsh Vardhan moved the Bill for passage mentioning about amendments made by Rajya Sabha in the Bill. This including providing for a medical education system that improves access to quality and affordable medical education and ensures availability of adequate and high quality medical professionals in all parts of the country.
Minister of State for Road Transport and Highways Gen (Rtd) VK Singh on Monday moved the Bill to amend Motor Vehicles Act in the Lower House. On July 31, Rajya Sabha cleared the bill that seeks to weed out corruption, improve road safety and usher in use of technology to regulate traffic, with certain amendments. Since some changes were made by Rajya Sabha, it was again brought to Lok Sabha for clearance.
This apart, the Lok Sabha passed Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Bill 2019 and Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill, 2019. The transgender protection of rights bill was passed by a voice vote amid noisy protests by some opposition parties over Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury not being allowed to speak on his adjournment notice. Replying on the bill, Minister of State for Social Justice Rattan Lal Kataria said it makes provision for establishing a national authority for safeguarding rights of transgenders. The Minister said according to the 2011 census there are more than 4.80 lakh transgenders in the country.
A contentious provision that criminalised begging by transgender people has been removed from the bill. The provision was part of the bill when it was introduced by the previous government.
Moving the Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill, 2019 in the Lok Sabha for consideration and passage, Vardhan said that "A rough estimates says there are about 2,000-3000 surrogacy clinics running illegally in the country and a few thousand foreign couples resort to surrogacy practise within India and the whole issue is thorougly unregulated." The bill, he said "was the need of the hour." It seeks to ban commercial surrogacy.