Another Parliament session squandered
The government had to effect an ignominious retreat.
Concern is being voiced in the country whether the Modi government’s ambitious reforms agenda is faltering on account of the government’s conspicuous inability to manage national politics differently — away from confrontation, which it has been seen to be since the Lok Sabha election, to a more mature display of consensus-seeking so that a more constructive atmosphere may be generated to push the national effort. The short Winter Session of Parliament has whizzed by without the Rajya Sabha, in which the government parties are weak on numbers, able to transact any substantive legislative business. The all-party meeting on Friday, convened at the instance of House Chairman Hamid Ansari, did agree to clear some routine business. But it was hidden from no one that the amended GST Bill was not even a part of the discussion.
The Congress, the original proponents of GST during UPA-2 which had found its effort scuttled by BJP and others at the time, has some serious reservations to the measure as presented by the present regime. These were made known even before the Winter Session. But the government is yet to engage the main Opposition party in a serious discussion on the subject. All that has happened is that Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked his predecessor, Dr Manmohan Singh, and Congress chief Sonia Gandhi to tea. Exactly one year ago, the government had been unable to get the amended Land Acquisition Bill passed in Parliament. Apart from the trenchant criticism of the measure by the Congress, several BJP allies were not in favour, and sections of BJP MPs also expressed doubts about the effect of the measure on farmers. The government had to effect an ignominious retreat.
A year on, the amended GST has gone the same way. These are the two important pieces of proposed legislation that the government has sought to woo the investor community with. UPA-2 had found it difficult to manage parliamentary numbers even in the Lok Sabha. The massive vote in its favour in the Parliament election last May gave Prime Minister Narendra Modi a reassuring majority. Going by the look of things, however, the opportunity to do things with it is being squandered due to faulty politics. Confrontation has deepened within the political system. The National Herald case brought against the Gandhis by top BJP leader Subramanian Swamy blew up right in the middle of the Winter Session, fouling the atmosphere. This was followed by the CBI raid on a section of Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal’s office, uniting the Opposition. It is odd that the government should take no lessons from its humiliating defeat in Bihar and seek to soften the Opposition with appropriate gestures.
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