No minister, no bill: Govt retreat in Lok Sabha

The government was forced by the Opposition in the Lok Sabha today to shelve the scheduled passage of a bill, since neither the cabinet minister nor his deputy for the relevant subject were present — in fact, neither was in India.

The bill in question aimed to amend the Rubber Act, 1947, to change the definition of ‘small growers’ and to set up a Rubber Development Fund, to replace two existing funds. It was a bill of the commerce ministry.

But, cabinet minister Anand Sharma was in South Korea for the signing of a new trade agreement. The minister of state, Jyotiraditya Scindia, was in Indonesia on official work. In the afternoon, when discussion and passage was scheduled, BJP members pointed out the dual absence. And refused assent to go ahead, a right by tradition.

Leader of the House Pranab Mukherjee had to rush there, but it didn’t help; there was a temporary adjournment. When it reconvened, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pawan Bansal said there were at least two precedents when the minister concerned was not present but bills were passed. He also noted the bill sought only minor legal changes to give relief to rubber growers, to which the opposition had no objection.

But BJP’s deputy leader Sushma Swaraj shot back, “If the opposition was not alert earlier, it doesn’t mean it now has to sit idle.”

And, Mukherjee and other floor managers decided to defer the bill till the next session. The ministry later issued a statement saying that the bill was earlier scheduled to be discussed on August 3-4 but “because of repeated adjournments by opposition parties, it could not be taken up for discussion”. Since both ministers had to go out, Prithviraj Chavan, minister of state for parliamentary affairs had been asked to pilot the bill in their absence.