Highlights for Day 57 of Narendra Modi government Development Work
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- Category: National Political News
- Last Updated: Thursday, 22 January 2015 21:01
Highlights for Day 57 of Narendra Modi government Development Work
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'We are like nomads' says Member of Parliament on Seat allowance in Lok Sabha
Biju Janata Dal MP Pinaki Misra raised the issue in the House before beginning to speak on demands for grants of the Ministry of Environment. He said that it is surprising to see that a government, even after winning such a huge mandate, could not allocate seats to MPs.
The delay in allocation of seats in the newly-elected Lok Sabha came in for criticism on Tuesday with a member saying the representatives of the people had become "nomadic tribes" in the absence of dedicated seats to them.
"We are already half-way into the Budget session, but we are moving around like nomadic tribes," said Misra, who is second-time member of the Lok Sabha.
The allocation of seats to the members in the 16th Lok Sabha has got delayed because Speaker Sumitra Mahajan faces a tricky situation in view of the fact that AIADMK, Trinamool Congress and BJD are not keen about the idea of sitting next to Congress, according to Parliamentary sources.
Parliamentary observers say the Congress has been the main rival of the BJD in Odisha while Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress sometimes acts in support of the government and sometimes sides with the opposition.
Several rounds of meetings have been held to sort out the matter and the decision is expected soon, according to the sources.
Planned NCTC has been 'kept in abeyance': Government
The government appears to have given a quiet burial to the controversial proposal to set up anti-terror hub National Counter Terrorism Centre (NCTC) mooted by the previous UPA regime, as it announced on Tuesday that the plan has been "kept in abeyance".
"Operationalisation of the National Counter Terrorism Centre has been kept in abeyance," Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju told Lok Sabha in a written reply to a query.
The minister said that the issue of NCTC was discussed during the conference of Chief Ministers held on June 5, 2013 but the discussion remained inconclusive.
The proposal to set up NCTC was first initiated by the then Home Minister P Chidambaram but faced stiff opposition from many chief ministers, including Narendra Modi who was at that time heading the Gujarat government.
Those who opposed NCTC included chief ministers Mamata Banerjee (West Bengal), Jayalalithaa (Tamil Nadu), Raman Singh (Chhattisgarh) and Shivraj Singh Chouhan (Madhya Pradesh) and Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal. The then Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar was also against it.
The chief ministers opposed NCTC on the ground that it would hurt the country's federal structure by allegedly giving unilateral powers to the central agencies to carry out operations against terror suspects.
Even though the proposal was modified when Sushil Kumar Shinde assumed charge of the Home Ministry by giving more say to the state governments, there were a few takers for the watered-down proposal.
Is PM Modi god to give irregular darshan in Parliament: LOP to Swaraj
"Is Prime Minister a god that he should give us darshan" once in a while, Leader of Congress in the Lok Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge remarked sending the members into peals of laughter on Wednesday.
The poser by Kharge was in response to External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj's dig at him over his remarks on Tuesday that Narendra Modi should show his face in Parliament at least once a week. Swaraj said since he made the complaint, the Prime Minister was in the House during Question Hour and "you had his darshan".
Pat came the reply from Kharge whether "the Prime Minister is God to give occassional darshan". "The Prime Minister should show his face, at least, once in a week. I do not expect him to come here every day. After the Budget Session, he did not come to the House," Kharge had said on Wednesday.
Swaraj earlier took a swipe at Kharge noting that Manmohan Singh had gone to five BRICS summits as Prime Minister but did not give any statement to Parliament even once. Only once the External Affairs Minister had made a statement, she said, adding the new government was setting up a new tradition by giving a statement on the Prime Minister's visit to Brazil to participate in the sixth BRICS summit.
Written by Aadil Mir