Decides not to prorogue the houses of Parliament to facilitate special session.
New Delhi : With a special session in mind to pass the GST Bill, the govt today decided not to prorogue the two houses of parliament.
In a Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs (CCPA) meeting held early on Thursday, senior ministers took a call that it would be better to keep the option open for a special session. Hence, it was decided not to recommend to prorogue the house for now. Top sources said the govt could go for a short special session with the sole agenda of passing the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Bill in September.
But this decision would depend on whether there is some significant headway with other parties and if the government manages to rope in some regional parties to support the GST bill. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has been arguing that if all regional players come on board, the Congress may not be able to hold it up in Rajya Sabha. ”The regional parties are even bigger votaries of the GST bill than the BJP because almost all the states ruled by these parties are consumer states which stand to gain from the Goods and Services regime”, Jaitley said in a clear reference to parties like the TMC, BJD, AIADMK, JDU etc.
Chidambaram”s terms for GST Briefing mediapersons, the former finance minister P Chidambaram said that the Congress is the author of the GST bill and it does want that it should be passed. ”We still do not know why was the BJP obstructing the passage of this bill for all the years when we were in power? But our objections are fundamental and substantive. Let the government respond to our demand for a discussion and arrive at the consensus on the fundamental objections and then I do not see any reason why the party will not co-operate.” he said.
But he added that they want a good GST, not this GST riddled with problems and issues. Among the demands from the Congress party is a cap on GST at 18 percent, no additional one percent tax to be imposed by states and dispute resolution mechanism independent of the GST council.
Meanwhile, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi kept up his stringent attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi as well as the NDA government Interacting with mediapersons at the end of the session, the Congress vice-president spoke at length about Modi and his government. “Maine inse chunaav haara, par lagaa bande mein dum hai…lekin ab lagta hai bande mein damm nahi hai”( After we lost the election, I thought (PM Modi) had it in him, but now we know, he doesn”t have ”dum” (guts),”he said, adding that when 40 Congress MPs put pressure on him, Modi did an about-turn and left the ground in a reference to the NDA government”s climbdown on the Land Bill.
Gandhi described Lalit Modi as the symbol of black money in India and said that Prime Minister Modi under Congress pressure would be forced to get him ( Lalit Modi) back to India.”He (PM Modi) has to clean up the game of cricket. In IPL, there are two networks. One is what the youth sees on field, and the other is the Lalit Modi”s network of black money. There is a link between Lalit Modi, black money and the political system”, Gandhi observed while adding that the NDA government was protecting Lalit Modi.
The Congress vice-president, who has been under attack from senior BJP leaders, including Sushma Swaraj who referred to his father Rajiv in the context of the Bofors scandal of the 80s, also continued his attack against the minister. “For 30 years the BJP has lied about my father”, the judicial system of India has cleared Rajiv Gandhi,” he said in a reference to 2004 Delhi High Court order which said that there was no evidence that Rajiv Gandhi had accepted bribes. Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated in 1991.
However, Gandhi broadened the ambit of his criticism of Modi Sarkar and attacked it for bringing in mediocrity in institutions like the FTII. I am here to protect India from the RSS. I am here to protect India from Narendra Modi. The RSS is imposing a mediocrity on the country. I will not let that happen. The way this country is heading, you have cameras, very happy to make films, you will not be able to do it,” he observed.
