While several opposition parties criticised the move, Union minister Prakash Javadekar said the Parliament session is being held under special and extraordinary circumstances.
As the Odisha CM prepares to face the BJP onslaught, the BJP hopes to rope in some BJD heavyweights.
K C Venugopal (Congress) charged the Modi government with providing little funds for the MGNREGA.
Earlier, while presenting the Budget on February 1, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had proposed to cap cash transactions at Rs 300,000 with effect from April 1.
'The entire idea behind the serial bomb blasts was to strike fear in the minds of Indians.' 'I don't think the blasts were targeted to derail the Indian economy; the idea behind the blasts was retribution.'
Following the Budget being announced by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, leaders across the political spectrum provided their views.
Lok Sabha is set to witness a confrontation over Land Acquisition Bill on Tuesday when it is taken up for voting with opposition bent on opposing it even as the government again offered to make changes in the legislation in the "larger interest" of the farming community.
'The BJP will be the single largest party in the next Lok Sabha, the only one party with a three digit tally.'
Lack of numbers would upstage it in Rajya Sabha
'Each of them is a setu (bridge) that links the government with the party, but their territories are different.'
Gandhi accused Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik of being remote-controlled by Modi
"It is about time that India and its institutions are protected from these 'institution wreckers'," said Jaitley.
A total of 13 motions were moved in support of Birla.
With almost all opposition parties and several trade unions backing the 'Bharat Bandh' and many announcing parallel protests in support of the farmers, the Centre has issued an advisory directing all the states and Union Territories to tighten security and ensure COVID guidelines are followed.
'KCR's plan for the future is three-pronged. He wants to see a non-Congress, non-BJP government at the Centre in 2019 so that he can become the Union minister for home or defence,' says R Rajagopalan.
'AAP's real value must be measured not by the number of Lok Sabha seats it wins in the election -- which may not exceed 10 or 15 -- and not even by the number of votes it takes from the BJP, but by its ability to deflate Modi's superhuman '56-inch chest' image and the charisma so assiduously manufactured around him by the corporate-controlled media.'
"Horse trading band karo (Stop horse trading of MLAs)," Congress members shouted from the well.
The Aadhaar and Other Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2019 was passed in Rajya Sabha by a voice vote, although many parties including the Trinamool Congress and Dravida Munnetra Kazagham opposed it citing various reasons, including apprehensions data theft.
The fate of 961 candidates, including Union ministers Giriraj Singh, Subhash Bhamre, S S Ahluwalia and Babul Supriyo of the BJP and former Union ministers Salman Khurshid and Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury of the Congress, will be decided by about 12.79 core voters in the fourth phase.
The passage of this major legislation comes ahead of the general election due early next year.
'Mayawati is an experienced politician with a track record in national politics much longer than Modi's.' 'She must be sensing from the tremors in the Hindi heartland she crisscrossed in recent months that the prospect of another Modi-led government at the Centre is fast receding,' says M K Bhadrakumar.
2,470 BJP workers from across the country would spend a year visiting polling booths, while another 1,441 workers would spend six months and 378,000 workers will spend 15 days to reach out to party cadres and ensure better polling management in areas outside their home districts.
'It will be fascinating to see how Modi, for the first time in his political life without a majority, is able to manage the ambitions and the conflicts,' says Aakar Patel.
'When a criminal assumes a new identity he think everybody knows them by that name only.' 'Criminals forget that the police are always hunting for them to put them in jail.'
Hijacking of an aircraft will now entail capital punishment in the event of death of "any person" as Parliament on Monday passed a bill to provide widen the ambit of the law in dealing with this crime.
The results will be declared on July 20 in New Delhi.
Is anyone in the BJP listening -- to what Nitin Gadkari had to say, but possibly left unsaid? asks N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Anti-incumbency, especially in Maharashtra; the BJP's success in creating a new social coalition; and the sheer force of the party's campaign which overwhelmed its opponents,' argues Praful Bidwai, brought the BJP victory in Haryana and Maharashtra, not the Modi effect.
The opposition in Lok Sabha on Monday tore into the controversial Land Acquisition Bill
Combative Congress members, upset over the National Herald case, on Tuesday paralysed Parliament protesting against alleged "vendetta politics" leading to repeated adjournments in the Lok Sabha as well as Rajya Sabha.
States are apprehensive of losing their rights to raise revenue during emergencies.
At least eight MLAs of the opposition Congress in BJP-ruled Gujarat appeared to have voted for Kovind.
A weak presence in the Rajya Sabha has forced the NDA to try and rope in 'weak links' in the Opposition ranks to pass key legislation in the Upper House.
'It would have been much more appropriate if a law such as this, which all of the civilised world has given up, was struck down through democratic politics rather than five individuals sitting in judgement,' says Aakar Patel.
A parliamentary panel termed the government's proposed 85 per cent pictorial warnings on tobacco products as "too harsh" and recommended a drastic reduction in size.
The AAP won in 62 with a total vote share of 53.58 per cent. The BJP recorded victory in eight seats, receiving 38.49 per cent of the total votes. The Congress could not even manage a single seat and ended with 4.27 per cent vote share.
'There are no jobs, the economy is slowing down, but the BJP is more concerned with issues like triple talaq, anti-Romeo squads and the beef ban.'
Protests over "politics of vendetta" continued in Rajya Sabha for the second day on Wednesday, with Congress members forcing two adjournments of the House till noon by storming the Well and raising anti-government slogans.
The path-breaking Land Acquisition Bill, which seeks to provide just and fair compensation to farmers while ensuring that no land can be acquired forcibly, was passed by the Lok Sabha with overwhelming majority on Thursday.
EPS' real test will commence with a decision whether or not to patch up with OPS and on what terms -- and then, to decide whether or not to have the BJP for an electoral ally, come 2024, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
