The Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday sought to re-unite the opposition by apologising on behalf of the seven Members of Parliament suspended for unruly behaviour and demanding that the government express regret for using marshals during the passage of the Women's Reservation Bill. Opposition parties and those supporting the United Progressive Alliance government from outside like Rashtriya Janata Dal, Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party were united against it.
A day after the Trinamool Congress abstained from voting on women's reservation bill in the Rajya Sabha, party supremo Mamata Banerjee tonight met Congress president Sonia Gandhi and explained her party's stand.
Trinamool Congress chief and Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee attributed her party's abstention from voting on the Women's Reservation Bill in Rajya Sabha to a "communication gap" and said she was committed to the Constitutional amendment.
When the House reassembled at noon after the first adjournment, members of Samajwadi Party, Rashtriya Janata Dal, Janata Dal-United and Lok Janshakti Party rushed menacingly to the well shouting 'marshal bulao' (call the marshals), prompting Speaker Meira Kumar to immediately adjourn the House till 1400 hours.
As soon as the Question Hour began, the issue was raised by Ramgopal Yadav (SP) and supported by RJD members. Even CPI-M leader Sitaram Yechury favoured the revocation of the suspension. Members from the treasury benches, however, insisted that the suspended members should tender apology.
Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad on Tuesday said he would hand over to President Pratibha Patil on Wednesday a letter withdrawing support to the United Progressive Alliance government, over the issue of the Women's Reservation Bill, while SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav remained non-committal on the issue.
Kavitha Kalvakuntla, 44, a Bharat Rashtra Samiti MLC, declared this in a late-night post on her official Twitter handle.
Kavitha said 'these tactics of intimidation' against the fight of her father and Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao and the BRS would not deter them.
Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh alleged that the new Parliament building should be called a 'Modi Multiplex or Modi Marriot'.
The dramatic moves of Donald Trump, which have shaken up the global order, dominated the discussion. A sense of bewilderment prevailed, but there was also expectation that President Trump would settle down to a more traditional style of governance after a time of shock and awe, observes Ambassador T P Sreenivasan, an attendee at literary festivals in Calicut, Jaipur, Kochi, Sharjah and Thiruvanathapuram.
Manmohan Singh represented the finest aspects of India, asserts Aakar Patel.
'In the long run, I don't foresee major ramifications [about Trudeau's allegations].' 'There's just enough hypocrisy among Western nations for India to douse the outrage.'
All the four suspended Rajya Sabha members of Samajwadi Party have met Chairman Hamid Ansari and apologised for their unruly behaviour on Monday over the Women's Reservation Bill, a move that could pave the way for revocation of their suspension.
No signs of tension reflected on the faces of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee. The trio in fact stayed back in Lok Sabha even after the House was adjourned for an hour.
Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad and Samajwadi Party leader Mulayam Singh Yadav, two prominent opponents of Women's Reservation Bill, had a nearly 20-minute interaction with Congress president Sonia Gandhi in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday, but both sides appeared to have failed to convince each other.
Seven members of the Rajya Sabha belonging to the Samajwadi Party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Lok Janshakti Party and an independent Member of Parliament were suspended on Tuesday for the remaining part of the budget session for their unruly behaviour in the House on Monday over the Women's Reservation Bill.The suspended members are Subhash Yadav (RJD), Sabir Ali (LJP), Veerpal Singh Yadav, Nand Kishore Yadav, Amir Alam Khan and Kamal Akhtar (SP) and Ejaz Ali.
Sixty-eight Rajya Sabha members, including nine Union ministers, are completing their tenure this year, triggering a race of sorts among leaders across political parties to eye a six-year term in the Upper House of Parliament.
There is a serious move afoot to reschedule the second half of the budget session of the Parliament with sources disclosing that leader of the Lok Sabha and Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee would discuss the rescheduling of dates in the meeting of floor leaders of political parties which he has called on April 5.
Upset over the 'manner' in which the government got the Women's Reservation Bill passed in the Rajya Sabha, an angry Trinamool Congress on Tuesday accused it of buckling under Left pressure and not trusting its own ally.
"The provision for reservation of women should be confined to only 10 per cent instead of the proposed 33 percent and the onus of fielding women candidates from any seat be left to the parties and not the election commission," Mulayam said. \n\n
The 'Karnataka Protection of Right to Freedom of Religion Bill' was passed by the Legislative Assembly in December last.
The Left criticised the UPA government for not taking expeditious steps to bring comprehensive legislation on agricultural workers and giving land to the tribals.
'Ever since the UPA came to power, barring making statements that they are committed to fighting terrorism, it is not being said in actions,' says senior BJP leader Sushma Swaraj.
In her first address to a joint sitting of the two Houses in the new Parliament building in which she touched on varied issues ranging from insurgency to inflation, Murmu said a country can progress at a fast pace only when it defeats the challenges of the past and puts maximum energy into building the future.
Announcing this, Speaker Somnath Chatterjee thanked the members for their cooperation in passing the Finance Bill 2008, but regretted that 28 hours and 30 minutes were lost due to interruptions and forced adjournments. However, he also noted that the House sat for an extra 36 hours and 38 minutes to compensate for the loss.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar denied any differences with Janata Dal-United president Sharad Yadav and said he would meet him when he would go to Delhi for a meeting with Prime Minister Singh as a member on the Core Group seeking a consensus on Women's Reservation Bill.
On the issue of no-trust motion, Lalu Prasad, whose RJD has four members in the Lower House, said, "There is no such decision. It is wrong information. We have only four MPs and, therefore, where is the question of no-confidence motion."
With Congress parliamentarians providing protective cover, Law Minister H R Bhardwaj introduced the controversial Bill in the midst of Samajwadi Party members trying to snatch its copies from the hands of the Minister. SP members stormed the well soon after the House resumed at noon in an apparent attempt to stall introduction of the Bill, which they have been opposing along with Janata Dal-United.
The National Judicial Commission Bill, 2022, was introduced after the majority of voice votes were in its favour.
The contentious anti-conversion bill was cleared by the Karnataka Cabinet on Monday and it is most likely to be tabled in the legislative Assembly on December 21, official sources said.
There was no official word on the agenda of the session which will be held days after the G20 Summit in the national capital on September 9 and 10.
The three-month long budget session of Parliament was adjourned on Tuesday, sine die three days ahead of schedule, amid acrimonious scenes in Rajya Sabha over the introduction of the Women's Reservation Bill.
A number of members sought to raise different matters simultaneously soon after Question Hour.
Amid reports of differences in the Bharatiya Janata Party over the women's bill, its MP Yogi Adityanath said on Thursday that there should be "internal democracy" on such issues and cautioned the party not to fall into Congress' "trap" of diverting the nation's attention from other important matters.
The principal opposition party though appeared content securing 99 of the 543 seats in the 2024 national elections as against its all-time low of 44 in 2014 and then 52 in 2019.
The bill on separate Telangana could rock the last session of the 15th Lok Sabha beginning Wednesday with several parties asking the government to first get the Vote on Account passed before taking up any other legislation.
Voters, it is said, get the government they deserve. We will soon see what voters in Maharashtra choose. Till then, a sense of helplessness and scepticism hangs in the air, notes Ramesh Menon.
The results of the assembly elections in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh are also likely to play out during the start of the session.
The government on Monday said that matters regarding Chinese intrusion can't be discussed in Parliament as it concerns the security of the country.
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