The Rajya Sabha should “check haste, cool passion and control legislation”, vice president and chairman of the Upper House Hamid Ansari said, countering the BJP’s preference for the Lok Sabha.
He told newly elected and nominated members that the Upper House exists for several reasons, quoting a first generation American legislator that it is required to “cool the tea”.
“The purpose (of the Rajya Sabha) is to check haste, cool passions and control legislations. All three are important. Often it happens that for one reason or another sufficient attention is not given either to the purpose of legislation or to the wording,” he said, addressing an orientation programme for the new MPs.
Angered by the rumblings in the Rajya Sabha that stalled the GST Bill, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley last year asked if an indirectly elected House can block a bill passed by the directly elected one.
Ansari challenged that supposition, saying India, unlike the Russian Federation, is an “indestructible” union of states.
“Under the Union of States, purposes are specified, the intentions are specified. But because it is a Union, the states have certain interests, which are not necessarily reflected in the other House,” he said. “Therefore it is expected, and happens on many occasions, that individual states’ interests are flagged in the Rajya Sabha.”
From what he could read of the Constitution, the vice president said the two Houses are equal. “Wherever the two Houses are mentioned, the Council of States or the Rajya Sabha is mentioned before the House of People or the Lok Sabha,” Ansari said.
He expressed concern over the shortened sessions, even as he slammed frequent disruptions by groups and individuals who virtually hold the House “at ransom”.
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