2 days Ago By Mohua Chatterjee
NEW DELHI: Rajya Sabha chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar walked out halfway through business advisory committee (BAC) of the Upper House on Friday, over a standoff with opposition party leaders who insisted their issues including the “EPIC fraud” be taken up for discussion in the House over the next week, failing which the parties would not “cooperate” in passing of Bills in the last week of the Budget session. With opposition party leaders threatening “not to cooperate” with government business, the last week of the budget session could get stormy. The treasury versus opposition standoff at the BAC on Friday has united the opposition against the Chairman.
Congress chief whip in Rajya Sabha Jairam Ramesh, is learnt to have led the charge on behalf of opposition parties –TMC, SP, DMK and others -- at Friday’s BAC meeting of floor leaders, called to decide on issues to be taken up by the House next week. Opposition leaders have conveyed to the Chairman that they are flexible on rules under which discussion on EPIC can be held, as well as wording of the notice, but the discussion should be taken up, sources said. TMC which has been raising the issue consistently in the House with multiple MPs giving notices every day, has warned of protests if the debate is not taken up.
Rajya Sabha sources, however said, the EPIC (Electors Photo Identification Card) issue was not discussed and Dhankhar decided to walkout as government and opposition members refused to budge from their respective positions on issues at the meeting. Sources said, opposition leaders at the meeting told Dhankhar, that they had been giving “daily notices” under various rules, since Parliament opened for the second half of the budget session, to take up issues like duplicate EPIC (Electors Photo Identification Card), Manipur situation, scrutiny of bills, etc in the House and wanted time to be allotted for debates on them. When Dhankhar refused to commit on allotting time to debate the issues, Congress, TMC and other opposition leaders threatened not to cooperate with the treasury benches next week for passing of bills, it is learnt.
The chairman left in a huff due to disagreements between ruling and opposition members over the demand for a discussion on "duplicate" voter id numbers and sending bills for scrutiny by parliamentary committees, opposition sources said. Stressing that the opposition has supported government business this session, yet issues they are seeking to discuss are not being listed, an opposition leader said, that is what sparked the standoff. Stay updated with the latest India news , weather , and Air Quality Index (AQI) updates for major cities like Delhi , Mumbai , Noida , and Bangalore on Times of India .
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