The meeting of the Rajya Sabha Select Committee on Insurance Bill, scheduled for Wednesday, was postponed since two BJP members on the panel are now in the Union Cabinet, leaving the party “unrepresented” in the Committee.
Committee Chairman Dr Chandan Mitra put off the meet after BJP’s Rajya Sabha members Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Jagat Prakash Nadda joined the Modi Cabinet.The Committee was supposed to meet for a clause-by-clause reading of the Insurance laws (Amendment) Bill, 2008 on Wednesday.
“Since there are no ruling party members and I as Chairman have to play the role of a moderator, I decided to put off the meeting,” Mitra said.“To fill up the vacancies a resolution will now be moved in the Rajya Sabha in the Winter Session of Parliament,” Mitra said. It is expected that the committee may now meet by the end of November.
The committee when constituted had Chandan Mitra, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Jagat Prakash Nadda (all BJP), Anand Sharma, BK Hariprasad and JD Seelam (all Congress), Satish Chandra Misra (BSP), KC Tyagi (JD-U), Derek O’Brien (Trinamool Congress), V Maitreyan (AIADMK), Naresh Gujral (SAD), Ram Gopal Yadav (SP), Kalpataru Das (BJD), P Rajeeve (CPI-M) and Rajiv Chandrasekhar (Independent) as its members.
The Insurance Bill that aims to increase the private equity from 26 to 49 per cent in the insurance sector was in August referred to the Select Committee of the Rajya Sabha.