The CAA, enacted by the BJP-led government at the Centre in 2019, aims at granting Indian citizenship to persecuted non-Muslim migrants, including Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis and Christians, from Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Afghanistan who entered India before December 31, 2014.
The Privileges Committee said that 'notwithstanding the overriding effect' with regard to applicability of the Right to Information Act, 2005 vis-a-vis other laws, the right to information accruing to a citizen under the RTI 'cannot abrogate privileges conferred under Constitutional provisions'.
A high-level committee to explore the feasibility of conducting simultaneous elections, headed by former president Ram Nath Kovind, held its first meeting in New Delhi on Saturday and decided to invite political parties and the Law Commission to seek their views on holding synchronised polls in the country, a statement said.
The opposition parties will meet on Monday morning to evolve their strategy in both Houses of Parliament after protests by them on the Hindenburg-Adani issue overshadowed most of the first half of the Budget session.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday claimed to have gathered documentary evidence in the cash for vote scam and has submitted them before the Parliamentary committee probing the matter, its senior leader Arun Jaitley said.
Former MP Sanjay Nirupam on Thursday took a swipe at the Congress leadership over his expulsion, claiming it was done after he sent his resignation letter to the party.
'Unlike in the sporting arena, where sports federations moved from partisan to impartial referees, in Indian democracy's biggest festival, it appears we are moving backward from unbiased and objective to one-sided and partisan,' observes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
A week after suspending them from the House for 'unruly' behaviour, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on Monday revoked the suspension of four Congress members, after seeking assurance from the Opposition that they will not bring placards to the House.
What stood out in his 15-year journey as a member of the political executive at the Centre was his glowing record as India's most successful and effective finance minister. Both as prime minister and finance minister, he understood the importance of gradualism, except when the economy or the polity was in a crisis.
The Upper House was earlier adjourned twice in the afternoon session when it took up the discussion on the Budget after Prime Minister Narendra Modi finished his speech on the motion of thanks on the President's address and the motion was passed.
Some commentators said Gandhi's decision will augur well for a party that needs to reinvent itself and present a clear vision to again emerge as a credible alternative.
In his letter to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla, Tharoor took strong objection to Dubey's remarks on Twitter that 'the Chairman of Standing Committee does not have the authority to do anything without discussion of the agenda with its members'.
Trinamool Congress leader Mahua Moitra's expulsion from the Lok Sabha triggered a political slugfest on Friday, with the opposition calling it a 'betrayal of India's parliamentary democracy' and the Bharatiya Janata Party asserting that it was an 'apt decision' as there was proof of the allegations levelled against her.
What some of our leaders were up to over the weekend...
Leaders of 24 non-BJP parties have been invited for the meet on June 17 and 18, the first edition of which saw the participation of 15 parties.
Christopher Wylie deposed before the House of Commons Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee amid an escalating row around alleged Facebook data breaches linked with the controversial UK-based company, which has also been linked with alleged attempts to influence elections in India.
The Lok Sabha speaker will meet the Leader of Opposition over breakfast on Tuesday to discuss ways to break the deadlock over the opposition boycott of parliamentary committees.
In an exclusive interview with Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt, BJP MP Harin Pathak, a member of the Joint Parliamentary Committee probing the 2G scam, says without mincing words that panel chief P C Chacko cannot decide exclusively whether to summon prime accused former Union Telecom Minister A Raja or not.
The second meeting of the NITI Aayog's governing council, was, however, attended by Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.
Nationalist Congress Party president Sharad Pawar on Saturday said he is not completely opposed to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) probe into the charges against the Adani group, but a Supreme Court committee will be more useful and effective.
Rita Bahuguna Joshi had fought the 2017 elections and defeated Aparna Yadav, the then SP candidate from Lucknow Cantonment.
'That would be very bad for them and suicidal for both the Gandhis and the Congress party.'
While Brijlal Khabri, former BSP MP from Jalaun, is UP Congress Committee chairman, former UP cabinet minister and Mayawati's once close confidant Naseemuddin Siddiqui heads the party's state media department. Completing the ex-BSP troika, Nakul Dubey, former UP cabinet minister in the Mayawati dispensation (2007-12), is one of the six UP Congress regional presidents. He is reckoned among the most active of the three.
Trinamool Congress leader Mahua Moitra was expelled on Friday from the Lok Sabha after the House adopted the report of its Ethics Committee that held her guilty of accepting gifts and illegal gratification from a businessman to further his interest.
The youngest in the CWC is 31-year-old Neeraj Kundan, who is an ex-officio member of the body as the president of the National Students Union of India, the students' wing of the party.
...why are the government is running away from a Joint Parliamentary Committee
'Rahul Gandhi is going to turn 54 and in India political leaders peak when they are around 60.' 'This 'bhai-behen ki jodi' has done a wonderful job for the Congress.' 'Priyanka Gandhi was a very effective campaigner.'
"A person cannot be punished twice for the same offence," a committee member said, adding that even BJP members took a "soft view" of the issue and were in favour of revocation of Chowdhury's suspension.
At a time 20-odd opposition parties, many of them regional rivals, joined forces over the Adani issue, Nationalist Congress Party supremo Sharad Pawar's open support for industrialist Gautam Adani has put a question mark on the durability of a non-Bharatiya Janata Party block in the run-up to the 2024 parliamentary elections.
However, there was no official word from the Lokpal.
Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who is hailed as the architect of economic reforms in the country, is a member of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance, it was announced on Tuesday.
Top military officers, including Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat, had been summoned to make presentations on military uniforms.
The three frenetic weeks of the Parliament's Winter session saw a security breach in the Lok Sabha, suspension of 146 MPs and the expulsion of Trinamool Congress member Mahua Moitra in the "bribe-for-query" case.
'All the big things happening today in economic development have their beginning in Dr Manmohan Singh's ideas.'
Moitra was expelled after the House adopted the report of its Ethics Committee that held her guilty of accepting gifts and illegal gratification from a businessman to further his interest.
Officials have said an absence of drainage system and safety measures, and use of basement for commercial activities in violation of norms led to the death of three civil services aspirants at the coaching centre.
As soon as Lok Sabha assembled, opposition members stormed into the well holding placards and shouting slogans. They demanded a Joint Parliamentary Committee probe into the alleged stock manipulation by the Adani Group.
Trinamool Congress's Lok Sabha MP Dinesh Trivedi would get the award for 2016 and Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha and Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad would get it for 2015, the Lok Sabha secretariat said in a statement.
Trinamool Congress leader Mahua Moitra on Tuesday claimed that the meeting of the ethics committee of the Lok Sabha was postponed to keep a Congress member away from the proceedings and adopt the report by a majority, prompting a sharp retort from Bharatiya Janata Party MP Nishikant Dubey.
Ashok Gehlot has proved that a strong state leader can challenge the Congress high command.
