Lokpal bill set to turn into first point of contention

The Lokpal bill is set to turn into the first point of contention between the beleaguered UPA-II government and the resurgent Opposition in the Budget session.

While, the BJP on Monday said that it would insist on a debate on the bill in the Rajya Sabha as early as on Tuesday, the government said that it would be difficult to find out time to take up the pending legislation in the session’s first half ending on March 30.

Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pawan Bansal said that the amendments moved by MPs on the bill in the Rajya Sabha during the winter session had lapsed as the Upper House had been prorogued after being adjourned sine die on December 29 last.

He said the MPs would have to move amendments afresh and they had already started doing so. “A member has moved some amendments. I believe some others may also do so. Even the government will have to move amendments afresh. These will have to be examined before taking them up for discussion,” he said.

Bansal also said that the priority for the government was to get the Vote on Account passed by March 30 and the Lokpal bill and other proposed legislations could be taken up after the session would resume on April 24 following a three-week recess.

While, the government included the Lokpal bill in the roll of 37 proposed legislations to be taken up by the Rajya Sabha, Bansal said that the government had “very little time” for legislative business in the first part of the session.

Meanwhile, keen to take on the politically weakened Congress-led UPA government, the BJP picked up the Lokpal bill thread on the first day of the Budget Session itself. Soon after the Parliament was adjourned on Monday after President Pratibha Patil addressed a joint sitting of both the Houses, the principal Opposition party made it clear that it would demand suspension of the Question Hour in the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday and insist that the House take up the stalled legislation.

Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha and senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley is likely to submit to Chairman Hamid Ansari a notice for the suspension of Question Hour on Tuesday. “The reason the government had cited then (on the last day of Winter Session) is that it wants more time to go through the amendments moved by the MPs. By now, it has had enough time to study them,” said Jaitley. He added that the BJP would demand that a debate on the Lokpal bill be the first business to be taken up by the Upper House in the Budget session.