Parliament...

“It was hard to disrupt after the no-confidence motion.”

The Rajya Sabha functioned for 68% of the time possible, according to the ministry.

Recent sessions of Parliament haven’t been as successful. The second half of the Budget session, between March 5 and April 6, was almost washed out, especially in the Upper House.

During the monsoon session the government survived the first no-confidence motion in fifteen years and the Upper House elected a new Deputy Chairman even as the Opposition stepped up its offensive against the National Democratic Alliance on issues such as the Rafale deal, exclusion of 4 million people in National Register of Citizens in Assam and non-implementation of promises to Andhra Pradesh.

As many as 17 bills were introduced during the session and the Lok Sabha spent the most time—49 out of 102 hours—in legislative business. A PRS Legislative Research analysis said this is “the highest amount of time spent on legislative business by both Houses in the 16th Lok Sabha; (and the) second highest since 2004.”

Congress leaders came out on the street inside the Parliament complex to protest against the government on Friday, but barring some sporadic protests, there was no threat of a washout, like the second half of the last Budget session.

Both Houses passed the Fugitive Economic Offenders Bill that is expected to prevent a recurrence of a recent rash of incidents where bank loan defaulters such as Vijay Mallya or fraudsters such as Nirav Modi have fled India for foreign shores. Parliament also cleared the bill for granting constitutional status to the National Commission for Backward Classes and amended the SC/ST bill to tighten the law against offenders. The two important bills aim to address concerns of socially vulnerable sections and can also be important political tools for the ruling section in election times.

Still, the bill to criminalize Instant Triple Talaq, approved in the Lower House, could not be passed in the Upper House when brought for debate on the last day. When the Upper House reconvened after two adjournments, Chairman Venkaiah Naidu announced that the Triple Talaq Bill can’t be taken up as a consensus on the issue is yet to be evolved.

With a year left for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the Centre withdrew the contentious FRDI bill that faced opposition from various quarters over the controversial bail-in clause. Finance ministry officials maintained that it may be brought back again after revisiting some of the provisions where concerns were raised.

In her valedictory speech, Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan maintained that the monsoon session has been “more productive and satisfactory” than the previous Budget Session and last year’s monsoon session. Both Mahajan and Rajya Sabha chairman Venkaiah Naidu maintained that the session furthered the cause of social justice with legislations such as the NCBC bill and SC/ST bill having a wide impact on the lives of the deprived population.

Addressing the House on Friday, Naidu said, “South West monsoon is very critical for the economy of our country and it has been by and large normal with only about 5% deficit in rain fall so far. And the Monsoon session of Parliament also brought new tidings marking a break from the last two sessions much to the delight of all those who have a stake in our Parliamentary democracy.” Still, while lauding members for this he reminded them that the productivity deficit still remains.

The Narendra Modi government also kept alive the chances of pushing the amendments to the land law as the joint panel reviewing the bill has been given time till the end of the 16th Lok Sabha to submit its report. The contentious bill proposes to relax norms for industries and developments for public purposes to acquire land.

“The discussion on the no confidence motion early on in the session resulted in diffusing the parliament logjam from the previous session. This then enabled the government to get parlimament’s approval on key legislation. One hopes that the bipartisanship on legislative extends to the winter session too,” said Chaksu Ray of PRS Legislative Research.

Interestingly, from the time the 16th Lok Sabha was constituted, till the end of the current monsoon session according to PRS: “fewer bills (have been) referred to Parliamentary Committees (26%) as compared to the 15th Lok Sabha (71%) and the 14th Lok Sabha (60%)”. tal, where Shaikh died, said, “While Shaikh attended school on August 7, she fell ill and remained absent for two days after that. On Friday morning, she complained of pain in the chest pain and stomach, and vomited blood. Her parents brought her to the hospital, but she was pronounced dead on arrival.”

Around 975 other children were also given the medication as a part of ‘National Iron Plus,’ a programme to address iron deficiency in students of government schools. The children were taken to Rajawadi Hospital in Ghatkopar and Shatabdi Hospital in Govandi.

“All the children were examined by the paediatrician and few of them complained of nausea and giddiness,” said Dr Padmaja Keskar, BMC’S executive health officer. “Most of them only panicked after the death of the child, and were anxious about their health,” she said.

For now, the tablet distribution has been discontinued and the pills have been sent for tests. Dr Avinash Supe, director, medical education, BMC, said the Food and Drugs Administration has collected samples of the iron and folic acid (batch number TAF 8069AL) tablets and will test them. The drugs were made in February 2018, with an expiry date of January 2020. The deworming medicines, Albendazol (batch number FAR6L733) had an October 2019 expiry date. “Tablets from both these batches have been discontinued with immediate effect from all the municipal schools. We will continue the medication once FDA submits its report.”

“We gave the tablets on Monday morning, but none of the students complained about stomach ache or any other symptoms,” said Sayyed Farhana Bano, the principal of the school which as around 1,200 students on its rolls. “Even Chandni did not talk about any pains on that day.”

Idzes Kundan, additional municipal commissioner, BMC, said Shaikh had been diagnosed with TB, but said they were not aware if she was on medication.

A resident of the Bainganwadi area, Haseena Bano, said, “We were told a girl has died after consuming a tablet from the school, in an announcement made on a community speaker, and we were told to check if our children faced symptoms such as vomiting, stomach ache and nausea. Some students in the locality said they felt nauseous and an ambulance was arranged to take them to Rajawadi.”

Iron tablets are administered to all students between Class 1 and Class 10 in municipal schools once a week for 40 weeks a year. Mahesh Palkar, the education officer, BMC said, “The tablets are prescribed under the ‘National Iron Plus’ initiative of the government and there hasn’t been any incident of reaction reported in the school after those tablets were administered on Monday. It was only after the local community centre made announcements about the girl’s condition that parents started taking their children to the hospital to ensure everything was alright”. Pacific region and happenings in West Asia, the hotline is expected to ensure cogent response from the two major defence allies.

The hotline was first proposed by the US in 2008 to the then United Progressive Alliance regime but was ignored due to pressure from the Cold war warriors in the Manmohan Singh government, the officials added. There is already a direct line between US National Security Advisor John Bolton and Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval.

India and US are also expected to finally sign the Communications, Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA) during the two-plus-two dialogue with both sides frenetically working on a mutually acceptable final draft. COMCASA is a foundational military agreement which will allow India to use US communications for its Us-built platforms. “The draft of COMCASA is being worked at and the agreement should be ready for initials during the ministerial dialogue, “said a senior South Block official.

India has also agreed to place a military officer at the US Central and Pacific Commands for better coordination between the militaries. Which US CENTCOM has both Pakistan and Afghanistan under its jurisdiction, the PACCOM is responsible for the Indopacific region.

The hotline and the signing of COMCASA will further reinforce the ongoing trend of the two countries working closely together. In recent weeks, the US has granted India a status hitherto reserved for NATO member countries to import key defence equipment and access defence technologies, and the two countries have resolved some sticky trade issues. On Monday, US President Donald Trump is expected to sign off on a waiver for India from a US regulation instituting sanctions against countries doing business with Russia, one of India’s key suppliers of defence equipment.

“The structural basis of India-us ties has never been better and defence is very much in the lead. Constant communication is central to taking it forward,” said S Jaishankar, former foreign secretary of India who has also served as India’s ambassador to the US.