Parl winter session: 39-member House subcommittee set up to evaluate ONOE bills.
News Mania Desk / Piyal Chatterjee / 21st December 2024
On the final day of Parliament’s Winter Session on Friday, both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha passed resolutions establishing a 39-member joint committee to investigate the two bills seeking simultaneous polls, or “One Nation, One Election” (ONOE). The administration chose to raise the committee’s size from 31 to 39 members after various political parties indicated interest in participating in the Bill scrutiny process. The committee will include 27 members from the Lok Sabha and 12 from the Rajya Sabha.
Bhratruhari Mahtab, a Lok Sabha member from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), is expected to lead the joint committee on ONOE bills. Other BJP MPs on the committee include Anurag Thakur, Parshottam Rupala, P P Chaudhary, Bansuri Swaraj, and Sambit Patra. Manish Tewari and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra were nominated by the Congress party to serve on the committee.The Committee has 39 members, including 16 from the BJP, five from the Congress, two from the SP, TMC, and DMK, and one each from the Shiv Sena, TDP, JD(U), RLD, LJSP(RV), JSP, Shiv Sena-UBT, NCP-SP, CPI(M), AAP, BJD, and YSRCP.
“The government agreed that the matter is very important and it relates to the reformation of the election process of our country. So, we agreed to include most of the prominent political parties,” Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju told reporters later. He said there was no limit to the size of the Joint Committee of Parliament and pointed out that one parliamentary panel examining Centre-state relations had 51 members.
According to PRS Legislative Research, a research organization that examines India’s legislatures, the Lok Sabha met for 52% of its allocated time and the Rajya Sabha for 39% of its scheduled time during the Winter Session. The session was frequently disrupted by issues such as the Congress’ demand for a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) investigation into allegations against the Adani group, the BJP’s allegations that the Congress leadership has “links” with investor George Soros, and Union Home Minister Amit Shah’s remarks about BR Ambedkar, the architect of India’s Constitution.
The discussion around the 75th anniversary of India’s Constitution, which lasted 33 hours in total, was the session’s highlight. According to PRS, Question Hour did not last more than 10 minutes on 12 of the Lok Sabha’s 20 days. Several notices of adjournment motions were received in the Lok Sabha, however none were accepted.On the final day of the session, both Houses adjourned without conducting any significant business due to opposition demonstrations. Om Birla, the Lok Sabha Speaker, advised members to take action if they engaged in rallies or protests on Parliament grounds.
The directions from the Speaker came after Parliament premises witnessed large-scale protests by both the Opposition and Treasury members on the issue of alleged insult to Ambedkar. “Do not resort to demonstration or protest at any gate or anywhere on Parliament premises. Else, the House will have to take serious action,” Birla said in the House on Friday.
