Passing pro-people bills in Parliament Rahul's litmus test

Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, who in the past one week has assured motley groups of getting different bills passed in the last session ahead of the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

Updated on: Feb 5, 2014, 09:02:14 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The resumed winter session of Parliament may be a litmus test for Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi, who in the past one week has assured motley groups of getting different bills passed in the last session ahead of the general elections.

A-file-photo-of-Congress-vice-president-Rahul-Gandhi-delivering-a-speech-during-the-All-India-Congress-Committee-AICC-meeting-in-New-Delhi-AFP-photo

Gandhi had met a delegation of street vendors, disabled rights group and anti-graft activists and assured that his party will try to get bills passed in Parliament session starting Wednesday.

There are 72 pending bills of which six key anti-graft legislations had been identified by Gandhi as a must to fight corruption. The Disability Rights Act recently approved by the Cabinet had the backing of both Rahul and Congress president Sonia Gandhi for assent in Parliament. A bill to regulate working of street vendors is also on high priority for clearance in this session.

Read: Cong fears parties may not aid Telangana formation

“I would like Parliament to discuss these bills. We will try to get the bills passed but cannot do it alone,” he had told a delegation of families, who lost their members while exposing corruption using the Right To Information Act.

Asking whether the government will use ordinance route if the Parliament fails to pass these bills, Gandhi said that ideally these bills should be brought in the Parliament without ruling out the Ordinance possibility.

Read: Despite debate, Rahul won't stop his media outreach

HT Edit: Debate, don’t stall House business

The issue of Telangana may become a stumbling block for the government as anti-Telengana members are expected to disrupt the House.

PM pins hope on opposition
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Tuesday expressed hope that Parliament will approve the Telangana bill and anti-corruption bills during its session beginning February 5.

After an all-party meeting, he said: “I sincerely hope that parliament, in its wisdom, will transact the essential business which is the primary concern of any legislature in a parliamentary democracy. And, of course, there is the vital issue of Telangana.

Also read:
HT Analysis: Rahul Gandhi should stick to running the Congress party

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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