Logjam persists; parties seek revocation of Cong MPs’ suspension
The prospect of the ongoing monsoon session of Parliament transacting any substantive legislative business, including passage of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) constitutional amendment Bill, looked bleak on Tuesday, with both the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government hardening their positions over the suspension of 25 Congress Lok Sabha members of Parliament.
Senior government strategists said they favoured revocation of the suspension but it was a call Speaker Sumitra Mahajan has to take. They also said there was no question of a rapprochement if the Congress persisted on with its maximalist demand that External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj quit.
A government source, with reference to the accord signed between the government and the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN), Issac-Muivah faction, said it was easier to talk to the Nagas than the Congress. Home Minister Rajnath Singh is likely to make a statement in Parliament on the agreement on Wednesday.
The government said it would ensure that the Lok Sabha functioned normally. The government, at the Business Advisory Committee meeting, listed several Bills for the Lok Sabha to take up for the remainder of the session that concludes on August 13. However, the government’s reformist Bills like the GST and Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Bills are listed in the Rajya Sabha.
In the morning, the Congress led the Trinamool Congress, Nationalist Congress Party and Janata Dal (United) to boycott the proceedings of the Lok Sabha. As the House assembled at 11 am, the Left parties, Samajwadi Party and Rashtriya Janata Dal members walked out to protest the suspensions. The Rajya Sabha was repeatedly disrupted by Opposition members and adjourned for the day.
The Lok Sabha functioned normally and took up legislative business, including passing a Bill related to demands for excess grants to the Railways for the year 201213. Other Bills listed for the next few days are the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Amendment Bill, the Negotiable Instruments (Amendment) Bill and the Delhi High Court Bill.
The YSR Congress and Telangana Rashtra Samiti MPs protested on state specific issues. Biju Janata Dal’s Tathagata Satapathy said legislative work should not be taken up during the period of the suspension of Congress MPs. The Speaker disallowed All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) MP P Venugopal from raising the issue of suspensions.
Congress President Sonia Gandhi and VicePresident Rahul Gandhi led the party’s boycott. The joint committee of Parliament on the contentious land Bill also couldn’t hold its final meeting, as one of its members Rajeev Satav is a suspended Congress MP. The committee is unlikely to meet its August 7 deadline with the meeting postponed for another six days and will seek another extension.
The Congress president termed the suspension as “murder of democracy”, to which the BJP released a list of previous occasions when Lok Sabha Speaker had suspended Opposition MPs during Congress governments. Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said the government “reached out” to the Congress and that party “backed out”. He said “Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi” were “squarely responsible for the logjam. The BJP Parliamentary Party meeting adopted a resolution to slam the Congress “obstructionist and anti-development” policies.