Trinamool Congress, a major constituent of the United Progressive Alliance, on Monday night decided to support the alliance's vice presidential poll candidate Hamid Ansari but oppose any decision to open the multibrand retail to FDI and bills on forward marketing in commodities and privatisation of pension fund in the monsoon session of Parliament.
Union Minister Kiren Rijiju on Tuesday said the Congress and other opposition parties have brought the no-confidence motion against the Narendra Modi government in the Lok Sabha at a 'wrong time and in a wrong manner'.
With the Monsoon session of Parliament set for a washout, BJP has started preparations for launching a "sustained" country-wide campaign to target the government over corruption issue including the controversial allocation of coal blocks.
Speaker Sumitra Mahajan said the session has been "more productive and satisfactory" than the previous Budget Session and last year's monsoon session.
Rajya Sabha was adjourned for the day on Friday amid an uproar in the House over the issue of law and order situation in Rajasthan.
The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved a draft of the Lokpal Bill, which will now be tabled in the upcoming monsoon session of Parliament.
Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee will present the Rail Budget on July 1.
With several Parliament sessions during UPA-II being largely disrupted, BJP leader Arun Jaitley on Sunday "regretted" that a lot of valuable time was lost in the last five years due to "confrontationist politics" and said the Opposition achieves much more through debates than disturbances.
The central government is looking to strengthen the boards of public sector banks (PSBs) by specifying terms of office and conditions of service for whole-time directors, and also seeking disclosures from all directors about interests in other companies. Through the Banking Laws Amendment Bill, the government is likely to introduce conditions for disqualification of whole-time and independent directors which are not specified in the current legislation. The Centre is seeking to introduce fresh changes that are aimed at strengthening the boards of PSBs, and holding their directors accountable, an official said.
The opposition strategy to corner the government on Manipur will continue in the Rajya Sabha as well, the sources said.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Friday defended the washout of nearly the entire Monsoon Session of Parliament by the Opposition saying a similar exercise in 2010 on the 2G spectrum issue had led to cleansing of the telecom sector and hoped it will bring transparency in allocation of natural resources.
The people of Kashmir are strong enough to handle the National Conference. But what about the soul-searching Congress, asks Aditi Phadnis
While Defence Minister Rajnath Singh spoke about the consensus, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pralhad Joshi said there is no need for a separate discussion in Parliament on the Pegasus issue during the budget session.
'If the business before the House is suspended under Rule 267 it will mean the government has recognised that there is great urgency (to discuss the Manipur violence).' 'Government doesn't want to recognise that at all.'
Terming the ordinance promulgated by the Union cabinet to implement the Food Security Bill as a "cruel joke" on democracy, Bharatiya Janat Party President Rajnath Singh said that his party would not oppose the passage of the bill in Parliament but seek amendments to it.
The Congress' chief whip Jairam Ramesh, said, 'Today, too, the INDIA parties demanded the prime minister's presence in the Rajya Sabha to make a statement on Manipur, to be followed by a discussion.'
Union Rural development Minister Jairam Ramesh is burning the midnight oil to bring the Land Acquisition and Resettlement and Rehabilitation Bill 2011 before the Cabinet on Monday so that it can be cleared and then introduced in Parliament before the Monsoon Session ends on September 8.
The Prime Minister's Office tweeted a picture of their meeting but shared no details about their talks.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and other Opposition leaders presided over a meeting to discuss strategy for the remaining period of Parliament
Left parties would launch an offensive in the forthcoming monsoon session of Parliament against the United Progressive Alliance government hiking prices of petroleum products, Communist Party of India-Marxist member of the Parliament Basudeb Acharya has said.
Sri Lanka is facing 'a very serious crisis' that makes India naturally worried, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar told an all-party meeting in New Delhi on Tuesday and dismissed suggestions about such a situation arising in India.
To be set up under the PPP model, the 20 institutes will offer undergraduate, masters and PhD programmes.
Most chief ministers are in favour of the new tax regime.
The government draft on the Lokpal Bill, which is expected to be considered by the Cabinet this week, does not include the prime minister in the purview of the ombudsman but the final call on the ticklish issue will be taken by Parliament and its Standing Committee. Disclosing this, Home Minister P Chidambaram said the Bill will be introduced in Parliament in the monsoon session starting on August 1.
Shiv Sena member of Parliament Sanjay Raut skipped appearing before the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in Mumbai on Wednesday for questioning in a money-laundering case, citing his engagement with the ongoing Parliament session in Delhi, sources said.
Former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, Bharatiya Janata Party ministers Ashwini Vaishnaw and Prahlad Singh Patel, as also former election commissioner Ashok Lavasa and poll strategist Prashant Kishor were among those whose phone numbers were listed as potential targets for hacking through an Israeli spyware sold only to the government agencies, an international media consortium reported on Monday.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Friday urged top opposition leaders to rise above political compulsions to take on the BJP in the interest of the nation and start planning "systematically" to realise the "ultimate goal" of winning the 2024 Lok Sabha polls
The Speaker of Lok Sabha in a two-page letter said that people had great expectations from MPs and had reposed their faith in them.
Law mnister M Veerappa Moily on Tuesday said it is possible for the government to meet the August 15 deadline set by social activist Anna Hazare for passage of the Lokpal bill in Parliament if all cooperate. "Yes, it is possible to meet the August 15 deadline, provided if all cooperated", Moily told mediapersons before leaving for Delhi.
More than 300 verified mobile phone numbers, including of two serving ministers, over 40 journalists, three opposition leaders and one sitting judge besides scores of business persons and activists in India could have been targeted for hacking through an Israeli spyware sold only to government agencies, an international media consortium reported on Sunday.
The chief minister and his wife Kamlesh Thakur presented a cheque of Rs 51 lakh to chief secretary Prabodh Saxena at their official residence in Shimla.
Trinamool Congress MP Derek O'Brien said the situation in Bihar is one of the reasons behind the Parliament session being cut short by the government.
The MPs criticised the Shiromani Akali Dal leadership for being in the Bharatiya Janata Party-led NDA even after these bills were proposed by the government.
In all, 26 sittings over 39 days. That is how long the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha were to have sat to complete government legislative and other business when Parliament met for the monsoon session on August 1.
Under attack from the opposition over the Comptroller and Auditor General report on coal blocks allocation, the government is all set to counter it through a nation-wide campaign by key ministers and partymen.
Away from the public glare, the Gandhis and the Mukherjees had a very private dinner at the country's most well-known address the Rashtrapati Bhawan.
The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance coalition at the Centre, which has been plagued by ally trouble, has finally constituted a coordination committee with all its alliance partners to hold regular consultations
Rajya Sabha member and Bhartiya Janata Party spokesman Prakash Javadekar said on Wednesday that the party would raise the issue of two major power failures in the Monsoon Session of Parliament, and would demand that the government institutes a high-level inquiry.
Fighting shy of affecting a complete overhaul of the union council of ministers where many ministers are holding dual charges, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress President Sonia Gandhi confined themselves to a mere change of portfolios before the monsoon session of Parliament begins on August 8. Renu Mittal reports.
He sought to nix speculation that the Congress and the Shiv Sena-Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray were working on a 'Plan B' to contest the 2024 Lok Sabha polls without his faction of the Nationalist Congress Party.
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