Both sides play their parts

Budget session turns productive

The just-concluded Budget Session of Parliament was more than a fair success. That Parliamentarians, the victors and vanquished, are still behaving like newlyweds, both quarreling and cohabiting, is a happy sign. Undoubtedly, there were numerous disruptions and hours wasted. But wayward students turning good, both Houses did sit extra

One is qualifying it because the third full session since the 16th Lok Sabha came into being has, mercifully, not relapsed into a mindless cacophony that was witnessed through much of the decade of the two UPA regimes and earlier, towards the end of the last century.

This is despite the indications of the end of the NDA government’s ‘honeymoon’ period and its inability to keep promises made during the last summer’s elections. That Parliamentarians, the victors and vanquished, are still behaving like newlyweds, both quarreling and cohabiting, is a happy sign.

The other beauty is of yesterday’s opposition behaving responsibly now that it is in power, realising the need for cooperation and working for it. The current opposition is certainly returning the past compliments and there is much opposition-for-the-sake of opposition. But there is greater amenability – obviously guided by the small opposition numbers.

Is a numerical mismatch necessary to make parliament function?

As per the available statistics, while Lok Sabha worked for 123 per cent of its scheduled time, Rajya Sabha worked for 102 per cent. Undoubtedly, there were numerous disruptions and hours wasted. But wayward students turning good, both Houses did sit extra.

The overall ethos in parliament was good despite Rahul Gandhi, apparently rejuvenated after two phases of absence, did storm the Lok Sabha during the second-half of the Budget Session, taking not just the treasury benches but his own party colleagues by surprise with spirited speeches and interventions.

He threatened to take the Land Acquisition Bill “to the streets” since he could not opposed it in Parliament. And a determined government, for reasons of numbers in the Rajya Sabha, is set promulgate an ordinance the third time over. Amidst this tussle, the larger issue of prospects of a bad monsoon ahead and rural indebtedness leading farmers’ suicides, remained largely untouched, save shedding of some crocodile tears. This is sad.

In Indian parliamentary system, where majority single party rule has not been strong for over three decades, legislations are generally opposed not only due to lack of robust consensus but to score political brownies. This is despite the fact that many legislations passed by BJP were formulated during the Congress rule.

The government got passed all of 23 Bills — including those related to the Union Budget and the Railway Budget — through, while Ministers made 50 statements. The legislation approved by Parliament included key reform measures such as the Insurance Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2015; the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2015; the Coal Mines (Special Provisions) Bill, 2015 and the Companies (Amendment) Bill, 2014.

The Question Hour used to be an educative experience in the past. After several years’ lapse, that ethos seems to return with questions replied, orally and in writing. It is creditworthy despite the government’s serious faux pas over Dawood Ibrahim, which may well have been the handiwork of a clerk mindlessly reproducing an old draft and the seniors, including the ministers, irresponsibly not checking it.

The government’s problem is with the Rajya Sabha. Its leader Arun Jaitley rightly called it a "house of obstruction.” Like in the US Congress, the Indian opposition's only goal seems to be to block the reforms agenda of the government. But Jaitley’s BJP forgot that it behaved irresponsibly and was instrumental for disruption of parliament the during UPA rule.

The blocking of the General Sales Tax bill, for which the Manmohan Singh government had striven hard, and for years, was an act of heightened irresponsibility on the part of the opposition, especially the Congress. On its part, the government skipped the voting in the Lok Sabha on this. The GST has been discussed, debated for the last two years.

What is the purpose of referring it to a committee which will probably reinvent the wheel? This is the loss to the nation’s economy. After being pilloried by the likes of Ram Jethmalani, the government did attempt to fulfill an election promise to tackle corruption — the Black Money Undisclosed Foreign Income and Assets (Imposition of Tax) Bill, 2015.

The ice on the cake called Parliament’s Budget Session, perhaps, was the historic India-Bangladesh Land Boundary Agreement. It was historic because India took 41 years to ratify a key international treaty. Modi had got around the obstructions from Mamata on this score. The government then got over its own political predilections of excluding Assam from the legislation.

The last minute course correction saved the government and the country a diplomatic disaster with a key neighbour whose leader has gone out of the way to keep the borders with India relatively free from fundamentalists and separatists. At the end, the encomiums heaped on External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj for piloting the bill made the belated exercise satisfying.

By Mahendra Ved