Centre proposes weekend Parliament sitting on March 27–28 to clear pending bills

New Delhi: The government has asked the Opposition if the Parliament can be run during the weekend on March 27-28, as it wants to bring in important legislation, and wants to make up for the losses of the disruptions.

The proposal comes as the ongoing Budget Session’s second phase has seen repeated disruptions by Opposition protests and the government’s refusal to see ground on key issues, severely impacting legislative business.

To the Opposition, the government has cited a cluster of public holidays this month, including Gudi Padwa, Ugadi, Eid, and Ram Navami, as the reason for the compressed working calendar, making the March 28-29 Saturday-Sunday sitting necessary to clear pending bills.

Another key legislation is a bill to delink the Women’s Reservation Bill from delimitation, which has been reviewed and cleared by the ministry, and is with the Cabinet awaiting approval currently. The bill, which aims to implement 33% reservation for women in assemblies and Parliament seats, is expected to be introduced in Parliament this session.

On Friday, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla appealed to protesting Opposition MPs to allow Question Hour to proceed, saying that when given the time and opportunity to speak, they were choosing not to and instead creating a deadlock that was unbecoming of parliamentary decorum.

The Budget Session is being held in two phases: the first ran from January 28 to February 13, and the second is scheduled to conclude on April 2.