Venkaiah Naidu pulls up opposition over frequent parliament disruptions

Minister for Parliamentary Affairs M Venkaiah Naidu on Tuesday said that the opposition had let the country down in the Rajya Sabha by causing repeated disruptions and added that the interest of the country has been held captive due to the same.

"On the whole, Lok Sabha passed a record of 18 Bills. Why is it that the Rajya Sabha was marred by disruptions 16 times, whereas the Lok Sabha witnessed a lower number of disruptions? The broader issue now is how one should make use of the majority. Majority in the Lok Sabha was used constructively, but not in the Rajya Sabha," said Naidu.

"Opposition disrupts because they want to harm the agenda of development that we have. The opposition has let the country down in the Rajya Sabha. The interest of country has been held captive," he added.

He further said that passage of the GST Bill will be the most far-reaching bill since independence.

"The introduction of GST bill is a high point of Parliament winter session. It's historic. Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley took great pains in talking to different state governments and then brining them on board for the introduction of this bill. Lot of ground work has been done over it. When the GST bill will be passed, it will be the most far reaching bill since independence. It will also reduce corruption," he said.

Earlier in the day, the parliament met for the last sitting of Winter Session. At the time of sending this update, the Lok Sabha had adjourned Sine Die.

Ten bills have been passed by Parliament in this session. In addition, eight bills have also been passed by Lok Sabha, but could not be taken up in Rajya Sabha due to frequent disruptions.

Bills such as the Insurance Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2008 and the Coal Mines (Special Provisions) Bill, 2014 remain pending in the Rajya Sabha.

A snap shot of proceedings in both Houses during the over month long session indicates that the Lok Sabha was more productive (102 per cent) than the Rajya Sabha (61 per cent).

The winter session also saw discussions related to black money, religious conversions, natural calamities and dilution of MNREGA in Lok Sabha. Rajya Sabha discussed issues related to agrarian crisis, black money, sexual assault of a woman by a cab driver and government's stand on WTO.