Naidu pitches for detailed legislative impact assessment for informed law making

In a first, Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu on Tuesday interacted with new recruits of the Upper House secretariat and told them that a detailed impact assessment of legislation will help in realising the stated objectives of various laws.

Addressing 151 officials who have recently joined the Rajya Sabha secretariat, Naidu said it would be useful to indicate such impact assessment in the legislative proposals for wider dissemination among all the stakeholders.

Naidu said the inter-ministerial consultations are held before the Cabinet considers and approves legislative proposals but the scope for undertaking and indicating the impact of such proposals is limited in the present context.

Informed legislation will help in realising the stated objectives of various laws and this requires a detailed impact assessment of legislation at the stages of both pre-legislation and post-legislation, Naidu was quoted in a statement issued by the Rajya Sabha secretariat.

An account of pre-legislative impact assessment could be included either in the Bill or as an Annexure to the Bill, he added.

Elaborating on his suggestion, Naidu said that social impact assessment could indicate the social changes that flow from the implementation of a particular law while the economic impact assessment could throw light inter-alia on to what extent a legislation can address the existing inequity.

Environmental impact assessment of each law proposed is the need of the hour in the context of the serious nature of climate change concerns, he said.