Both Houses of Parliament, Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, were adjourned sine die on Friday, one sitting ahead of the scheduled end of the session. The current session of Parliament was scheduled to end on August 12, but Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla adjourned the House sine die.
During the session, the Finance Bill was passed. A bill to amend the Waqf Amendment law was also introduced and referred to a joint committee of Parliament amid protests over its provisions.
Om Birla also informed that the Finance Minister presented the Union Budget 2024-2025 on the floor of the House on July 23, 2024. The general discussion on the Union Budget 2024-25 lasted for 27 hours and 19 minutes, with 181 Members participating in the discussion. The Finance Minister replied to the discussion on July 30, informed Birla.
Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla further informed that 12 Government Bills were introduced and four Bills were passed during the session. The bills that were passed are as follows: The Finance Bill, 2024; The Appropriation Bill, 2024; The Jammu and Kashmir Appropriation Bill, 2024; and The Bharatiya Vayuyan Vidheyak, 2024.
The Rajya Sabha’s day was marred by multiple adjournments due to opposition protests and a walkout by Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankar. Samajwadi Party MP Jaya Bachchan demanded an apology from Vice President and Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankar after a heated exchange of words over BJP MP Ghanshyam Tiwari’s remarks against Leader of the Opposition Mallikarjun Kharge.
Jaya said, “I objected to the tone used by the Chair. We are not school children. Some of us are senior citizens. I was upset with the tone, especially when the Leader of Opposition stood up to speak, and he switched off the mike.”
“How can you do this? You have to allow the Leader of the Opposition to speak… I mean using unparliamentary words every time, which I do not want to say in front of you all. He uses words like a nuisance, Buddhiheen,” Samajwadi Party MP said. Bachchan was flanked by several other women MPs, including Sonia Gandhi. The women MPs backed her claims against the RS Chairman.
Earlier, amid the demand of Opposition Rajya Sabha MPs for expunging remarks of BJP MP Ghanshyam Tiwari about LoP, SP MP Jaya Bachchan made remarks about the tone of the remarks made by Chairman Jagdeep Dhankar. The Chairman took strong exception to Jaya Bachchan’s remarks, saying he does not want schooling and that he does not go by any script and has his script.
Reacting to this, the Opposition members staged a walkout from Rajya Sabha. As the Opposition MPs walked out, the Chairman referred to the anniversary of the Quit India movement and said the Opposition was quitting Parliament, their duty. Leader of House JP Nadda said that the conduct of the Opposition was improper and condemnable. He moved a “ninda prastav” over the behavior of the Opposition in the House.
The Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha adopted a motion naming 31 of its members to be part of a joint committee of the Houses.
21 MPs from Lok Sabha who will be members of the JPC are Jagdambika Pal, Nishikant Dubey, Tejasvi Surya, Aparajita Sarangi, Sanjay Jaiswal, Dilip Saikia, Abhijit Gangopadhyay, DK Aruna, Gaurav Gogoi, Imran Masood, Mohammad Jawed, Maulana Mohibullah Nadvi, Kalyan Banerjee, A Raja, Lavu Sri Krishna Devarayalu, Dileshwar Kamait, Arvind Sawant, Suresh Gopinath, Naresh Ganpat Mhaske, Arun Bharti, and Asaduddin Owaisi.
In Rajya Sabha, Kiren Rijiju proposed the names of 10 Rajya Sabha MPs for JPC into the Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2024; 21 Lok Sabha MPs are also part of the Committee.
10 MPs from Rajya Sabha who will be members of the JPC are Brij Lal, Dr. Medha Vishram Kulkarni, Gulam Ali, Dr. Radha Mohan Das Agrawal, Syed Naseer Hussain, Mohammed Nadeem Ul Haq, V Vijayasai Reddy, M. Mohamed Abdulla, Sanjay Singh, and Dr. Dharmasthala Veerendra Heggade.
Lok Sabha also passed the Bharatiya Vayuyan Vidheyak, 2024, through a voice vote, after discussion and a reply from Civil Aviation Minister Rammohan Naidu. The Bill provides for the regulation and control of the design, manufacture, maintenance, possession, use, operation, sale, export, and import of aircraft and for matters connected therewith. The new aviation Bill would open new areas of air travel, the minister said during the reply. He said the ministry is looking at the design of seaplanes and helicopters, and the Bill would help us do that.
Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw also introduced the Railways (Amendment) Bill, 2024 in Lok Sabha. The bill aims to amend the Railways Act of 1989 to enhance the powers of the Railways Board and improve operational efficiency. Key provisions of the bill include the integration of the Indian Railway Board Act of 1905 into the Railways Act of 1989. This move seeks to simplify the legal framework governing Indian Railways by repealing the Indian Railway Board Act of 1905 and incorporating its provisions into the Railways Act.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman introduced the Banking Laws (Amendment) Bill 2024 in the Lok Sabha. The bill provides for amending the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934; Banking Regulation Act, 1949; State Bank of India Act, 1955; Banking Companies (Acquisition and Transfer of Undertakings) Act, 1970; and Banking Companies (Acquisition and Transfer of Undertakings) Act, 1980. The Bill seeks to improve governance standards, provide consistency in reporting by banks to the RBI, ensure better protection for depositors and investors, improve audit quality in Public Sector Banks, and provide for an increase in the tenure of the directors (other than chairperson and whole-time director) in cooperative banks.
Chair Birla said the productivity of the House was above 130 percent. The productivity of the House during the session was 136 percent, informed Om Birla.
The bill to amend the Waqf law was also introduced and referred to a joint committee of Parliament amid protests over its provisions. The Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2024, Waqf Act provides for the renaming of the Waqf Act, 1995, as the Unified Waqf Management, Empowerment, Efficiency, and Development Act, 1995.
(With ANI Inputs)
