Budget session from Feb 21, Budget on Feb 28

The Budget session of Parliament will begin on February 21 and the Union Budget for 2011-12 will be presented on February 28. The date for introduction of the Railway Budget will also be worked out soon. Normally, it is presented two days before the Union Budget.

The Budget session would start with President Pratibha Patil’s address to a joint sitting of both Houses, Parliamentary Affairs Minister P K Bansal told reporters after a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs (CCPA), chaired by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee.

The first leg of the Budget session would end on March 16, and after a two-and-a-half week recess, the second half would start on April 4 and continue till April 21, Bansal said, adding that other details of the session would be worked out shortly.

The CCPA meeting was also attended by Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar, Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee, Overseas Indian Affairs and Civil Aviation Minister Vayalar Ravi, Law Minister Veerappa Moily and Textiles Minister Dayanidhi Maran, besides Ministers of State for Parliamentary Affairs V Narayanasamy and Ashwani Kumar.

The winter session in December was disrupted by the Opposition, which was demanding a Joint Parliamentary Committee probe into the allocation of 2G telecom spectrum. The Opposition is expected to disrupt the proceedings in the Budget session, too.

Bansal requested the Opposition to allow the coming session to function smoothly to dispose of important business.