‘Over the last 50 years, the number of sittings of Parliament has been declining and has halved since the 1960s’.
New Delhi
As yet another logjam continues in both Houses of Parliament, this time over the Manipur issue, with both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha facing repeated adjournments in the Monsoon Session, The Sunday Guardian attempted to decipher the “meaning in the madness” of total disregard for public taxes being wasted at the cost of zero legislative activity at the highest House occupied by elected lawmakers of the country.
The current impasse has brought back memories of repeated adjournments and disruptions of Parliament frequently over disruptive issues appearing days ahead of a Parliament session and taking center-stage just ahead of its commencement.
If we go back to Monsoon session 2021, when the Pegasus snooping controversy was reported for the first time on 18 July 2021, just a day ahead of Parliament going into session, we can recall Minister for Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw saying that the reports appearing a day before the Monsoon session of Parliament cannot be a coincidence.
A global collaborative investigative project had revealed that Israeli company NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware targeted over 300 mobile phone numbers in India, including that of human rights activists, lawyers, journalists, politicians, and dissidents from across the country.
The Centre denied all “over the top allegations” of surveillance using Pegasus Spyware. The Union government called the story “sensational”, and seeming to be an attempt “to malign Indian democracy and its well-established institutions”.
The NSO Group on 19 July also claimed that the allegations of snooping were false and misleading. “The report by Forbidden Stories is full of wrong assumptions and uncorroborated theories that raise serious doubts about the reliability and interests of the sources. It seems like the ‘unidentified sources’ have supplied information that has no factual basis and are far from reality,” the NSO Group said in a statement.
Similarly, ahead of the second leg of the Budget session 2023 that started on 13 March, a report by Hindenburg Research LLC, a US investment research firm with focussing on activist short-selling, marred proceedings in both Houses of Parliament amid an Opposition-government slugfest after Congress leader and now expelled MP, Rahul Gandhi, raised questions on India’s democracy in London during his talk after the Adani-Hindenburg report was published on 24 January 2023, ahead of the Budget session that started on 31 January.
While the first half of the Budget session is usually short and ended quickly on 13 February, after the budget was presented on 1 February, the second half in March was hit by the report as by then, the Opposition had stirred up a row. The Winter Session of 2022 was the 8th consecutive session to be adjourned ahead of its schedule. The session began on 7 December 2022, and was adjourned sine die on 23 December, 2022, four days ahead of schedule with both Houses witnessing repeated disruptions and adjournments as the Opposition raised a demand to discuss the India-China issue with Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh taking centre stage.
A first time MP and former cricketer Harbhajan Singh, who is from the Aam Aadmi Party, appeared both disappointed and confused as he witnessed the Houses being adjourned repeatedly over the last few days. Speaking to The Sunday Guardian outside the Parliament, he elaborated how he witnessed sloganeering from both the Treasury and Opposition benches. “Some in the Opposition had come in black-coloured clothes as a sign of protest,” he said on Thursday. “But I am new to this and I saw no actual business being conducted except for protests and sloganeering. How will things change if there is no discussion, how will things move forward?” he asked
When The Sunday Guardian contacted a veteran in the field, who has not only been a several time parliamentarian but also served as Governor of several states, including Jammu and Kashmir, Bihar and Goa, S.P. Mallik, shared the young AAP lawmaker’s view. However, Mallik said this pattern of disruption of parliament has been happening for a long time. Over the last 50 years, the number of sittings of Parliament has been declining and has halved since the 1960s. “Whoever be it in power faces it. Sometimes, most times it is the opposition raising an issue seeking discussion, but once in a while, it has also been the government which has fueled disruption in the past.”
He said, “This, however, is not helping a parliamentary government. Both sides should think about it and use corrective measure, as civil society in our country, which should have played a part, is quite useless. They do not even vote properly.”
So, the parties should sit together and working it out and that is the only way, he added. The Oppositions frustration basically comes out in these disruptions, especially in these terms when the BJP has had brute majority and the Opposition has not been able to make a dent.
On Thursday, after facing Opposition ruckus while making a statement in the House, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar attacked the Opposition saying, “If you cannot respect the President, Vice President, Prime Minister, if you won’t allow EAM to make a statement in Parliament, then it’s a very sorry state of affairs.”