The Narendra Modi government has an ambitious agenda for the winter
session of Parliament for which the Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary
Affairs (CCPA) has recommended 22 sittings, starting November 24 and
concluding on December 23.
The government hopes to clear over 30 bills that are likely to include
the long-pending Insurance Amendment Bill, the Constitution Amendment
Bills relating to national Goods and Services Tax (GST) and the Land
Border Agreement (LBA) with Bangladesh.
At Monday’s CCPA meeting, convened by Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh,
who heads the committee, the 67 Bills pending in both the Houses were
discussed. Later, Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister M. Venkaiah Naidu
was asked to circulate the list to all Ministries concerned and seek
their response within a week.
Interestingly, when the UPA government was in power, the BJP had blocked
the LBA Bill citing reservations of its State units in Assam and West
Bengal, which share a border with Bangladesh, while some BJP-ruled
States, including Gujarat (the Bill requires ratification by at least
half the States), had objected to the GST Bill.
The government also hopes to bring the Small Factories (Regulation of
Employment and Condition of Services) Bill, 2014 to govern small
factories employing less than 40 workers.
Short of majority
The key issue as far as Constitution Amendment Bills are concerned is
that the NDA is well short of a majority in the Rajya Sabha, and the
upcoming 11 biennial elections for Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand
announced on Monday will not change the composition in the NDA’s favour.
The government will also have to convert the two ordinances it had
promulgated since the last session into law. The first sought to shield
the National Textile Corporation from rent control laws that have been
used to evict its sick textile units from prime land in several cities
and restore the NTC’s rights over leased property lost to the original
landlord in court battles due to expiry of the lease period.
The other is the 27-page ordinance that paves the way for commercial
mining of coal by private firms or participating in auctions. The
ordinance was promulgated to tackle the crisis affecting the sector
after the Supreme Court in September this year cancelled almost all coal
mine allocations.
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