Modi govt treating Parliament as an extension of the Union Cabinet

That the Narendra Modi government gives two hoots to Parliament and democratic procedures was yet again evident on September 23, the concluding day of the monsoon session, when Rajya Sabha passed as many as seven bills in less than four hours, and that too in the absence of any Opposition members in the House.

If one finds it worrying that the Upper House of Indian Parliament passed the bills without any discussion and debate, a bigger shock is that all the bills – and a majority of them have far reaching impact on the lives of crores of farmers and workers – were passed without any Opposition member being present in the House.

The bills that were passed by the upper house include the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020; the Industrial Relations Code, 2020; the Code on Social Security, 2020; the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2020; and the Jammu and Kashmir Official Languages Bill, 2020, among others.

The first three bills relate to labour laws and thus have a bearing on the lives of crores of workers. Such bills not only demanded hours of discussion and debate in Parliament but also a closer scrutiny by a Select Committee to hold discussion with a wider set of stakeholders.

The FCRA bill, meanwhile, limits the use of foreign funds for administrative purposes by NGOs, such as paying salaries to its employees, to 20 per cent in place of 50 per cent earlier.

One may argue that it was the Opposition’s fault to not have been present in the House at the time of the passage of the bills. Well, not exactly. There is a background to why none of the Opposition members was present in the Rajya Sabha on that day.

The Opposition had boycotted the proceedings of Parliament after the government on September 20 got two the farm bills passed with voice vote, ignoring the Opposition’s demand to send the bills to a select committee for deeper scrutiny. Opposition MPs also alleged that the bill was passed with a voice vote in spite of some of them demanding a division of votes.

The MPs were enraged that Rajya Sabha TV, which telecasts the House proceedings live, was censored when the Opposition was protesting against the bills. Some of the MPs shot videos on their mobile phones of the ruckus, although that is against the rules.

Congress MP Pratap Singh Bajwa said, “We were demanding voting on the bills under Rule 252, which is our right. But we were denied this right. So its better you (government) tell us that you do not believe in the democratic process. What's the need to call Parliament then? You just issue orders outside Parliament like a Tughlaqi farman.”

Trinamool MP Derek O'Brien defended the filming of the protest by the MPs inside the House, and he himself shot a video in the Central Hall immediately after the incident.

"After the Opposition was deprived of its basic right...the Opposition was in the well of the House, there was protest, a lot of heat. Yes, two or three Opposition MPs broke microphones, but what do you want them to do, just keep sitting in their seats? Extreme situations asks for extreme forms of protest. What are you talking of breaking 2-3 microphones when the BJP is breaking the backbone of parliamentary democracy?" O'Brien said.

"You can't be writing your own rules for democracy. Yes, there are rules you shouldn't be shooting inside the House or the Central Hall, but we can't let BJP get away with everything. We shot the videos to keep a record of the things... Rajya Sabha TV was being censored. You are actually censoring the MPs, your elected representatives," he added. "If you want to suspend me for that, do suspend me. Suspend all of us."

After the ruckus, Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu – who was a senior BJP leader and a Union Cabinet minister before he was elected as the Vice President of India and by that virtue is ex-officio Chairman of the Rajya Sabha – suspended eight MPs from different Opposition parties for the rest of the session for ‘indiscipline’.

The Opposition jointly boycotted the proceedings of the House until their colleagues’ suspension was revoked and a new farm bill expressly mentioning the provision of Minimum Support Price (MSP) to the farmers brought in.

In parliamentary procedure, a committee consisting of floor leaders of all the major parties, called the Business Advisory Committee (BAC), meets every day during the session in the chamber of the Speaker/Chairman and the leaders discuss and decide as to what business the House would take up the following day such as what bills would be tabled etc.

Remember that since it is considered to be the government’s responsibility to run Parliament smoothly, the government tries to build a consensus over the bills in this meeting itself. Also, how much time would be allocated to each bill or each discussion etc is decided in this meeting. The allocation of time is not arbitrary, and is sometimes extended if the members so decide during the course of the discussion in the House. This is part of the parliamentary procedure as well as the tradition.

Opposition leaders boycotted BAC meet on September 22

Amidst their ongoing protest, the Opposition leaders had boycotted meeting of the Rajya Sabha’s Business Advisory Committee that had been called on Sep 22 at 6 pm. Five Opposition MPs on the 11-member committee – Anand Sharma (Congress), Derek O'Brien (Trinamool Congress), Ram Gopal Yadav (Samajwadi Party), Jairam Ramesh (Congress) and Manoj Kumar Jha (Rashtriya Janata Dal) – boycotted the meet. Which means that the BAC finalised the following day’s business in the absence of these floor leaders of various parties.

Leader of Opposition requested Chairman to withhold bills

Again, as their differences with the government over the bills and their democratic protest was going on, the Opposition leaders on September 23 requested the Rajya Sabha Chairman to not take up the three labour bills in their absence.

In a letter written by Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad to Rajya Sabha Chairman M. Venkaiah Naidu and signed by several Opposition MPs including Ram Gopal Yadav (Samajwadi Party), Derek O'Brien (Trinamool Congress), Tiruchi Siva (DMK), Elamaram Karim (CPI-M), Binoy Viswam (CPI), Sanjay Singh (AAP), Manoj Kumar Jha (RJD), Elamaram Kareem and Jose K Mani (Kerala Congress Mani), the Opposition parties urged Naidu to not let government unilaterally pass the three crucial bills as it would be a “great blot” on democracy.

“We urge you to not have the following three bills passed today in the asence of Opposition parties in the House...These bills affect the livelihood of crores of workers across the country. It will be a great blot on our democracy to have these bills passed unilaterally today,” the letter read.

Modi govt’s derision for parliamentary procedures/traditions

However, this government has scant regard for parliamentary traditions and it has made it clear on multiple occasions. The Union Labour Minister Santosh Gangwar not only tabled the bills, the same were “passed” by the ruling party MPs without any debate whatsoever.

This is not the first time in the last six years that the government passed a bill in the absence of Opposition MPs. On March 10, 2017, the government slyly introduced the contentious Enemy Property Bill in Rajya Sabha in the post-lunch sitting and got it passed when hardly a few Opposition MPs were present in the House as it was a Friday. Attendance in Rajya Sabha usually remains thin on Fridays as the House takes up private members bills. Besides, it was a weekend before Holi and most members had left for their homes.

Congress member Jairam Ramesh pointed this out and asked the government to take up the bill on the next working day. Some other Opposition MPs including Trinamool Congress' Sukhendu Sekhar Roy and Samajwadi Party's Javed Ali Khan seconded Ramesh. However, the government ignored the request and went ahead to pass the bill.

In the Lok Sabha, where the BJP has an overwhelming majority, it just bulldozes the bills with hardly any discussion or hardly ever accepting an amendment to a legislation proposed by any Opposition MPs.

After the September 20 pandemonium in Rajya Sabha, many people are wondering if Parliament has been turned into an extension of the Union Cabinet, where, informed sources say, ministers hardly get to discuss any legislations or policies. The agenda of the day just comes in and sails through.