Governments must ask themselves why they are intransigent towards political opponents
Posted Date – Mon, 04/10/23 at 12:15pm
Governments must ask themselves why they are intransigent towards political opponents
Hyderabad: The NDA government’s intransigence is largely to blame for the almost complete failure of Parliament’s budget session. As a result, neither pressing public issues nor any important bills could be discussed. It would be disheartening for the public to learn that the House of Commons was only 5.29% productive in the second part of the Budget, losing more than 96 hours due to interruptions, while the Royal Court lost 103.5 hours and was 6.4% productive. Over 103 hours were lost due to outages. The center has stood firm in the face of opposition coalition calls for the formation of a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) to investigate the controversy surrounding Hindenburg’s report on Adani Group stock manipulation. Instead, the finance minister seat disrupted proceedings in both houses, demanding an apology from Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for his comments in London that “democracy is under attack”. Tensions between the government and the opposition deepened when Rahul was disqualified as a senator a day after he was convicted in a Surat court last month in a criminal defamation case. Business in the House has been hit hard as both sides blame each other and steadfastly refuse to move beyond their differences. The chaotic standoff led to a total legislative deadlock. For 15 consecutive days, members from the opposition and the Treasury refused to budge from their minimalist stance. In this case, the ruling party always has the responsibility to ensure that legislative affairs are carried out in a relaxed manner.
The intransigence shown in the Treasury seat is a disservice to the people, who expect their elected representatives to take full advantage of the parliamentary platform to debate and discuss matters of public interest. While Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar observes that the “weaponization of politics” by stalling the functioning of parliament has serious consequences for our polity, the government must ask itself why it is being intolerant of its political opponents and prefers to shy away from meaningful dialogue. As expected, both the opposition and the BJP blamed the other for the stagnation in parliament. The first phase of the budget meeting runs from January 31 to February 13. Then the second phase lasted from March 13 to April 6. Throughout the session, the Lok Sabha held 25 meetings. Several bills have been put on hold without a chance for public issues to be discussed. Government policies and programs are not subject to constant parliamentary scrutiny, except for the work of committees that review budget proposals. The country watched as the budget provisions of the 45 trillion rupiah fiscal bill passed without any meaningful discussion.
