New Delhi: The Monsoon Session of the Parliament will commence from July 18 and end on August 12, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Venkaiah Naidu said today.
The decision was taken on Wednesday in a meeting of Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs (CCPA) chaired by Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh.
The Monsoon session will be crucial from the government’s point of view as Modi government has made public its intentions of once again pushing the passage of GST bill in Rajya Sabha.
“We are in the favour of passing GST in the Monsoon Session. We will speak to all parties on the issue even if it requires personal talks,” Venkaiah Naidu said while announcing the dates of upcoming session.
" We have been continuously engaging with all parties including Congress on GST, we will continue talking to them," he added.
After the recent elections to 57 Rajya Sabha seats, the BJP and NDA numbers have gone up in the upper house while the numbers of Congress has gone down.
Finance Minister recently said that except for Jayalalithaa government in Tamil Nadu, all other state governments including those led by Congress party were in favour of this bill.
Even the prime Minister hinted in a recent interview that only one party was creating hurdles in the passage of the bill.
The session comes at a time when the ruling BJP's morale is high after its maiden victory in Assam Assembly polls and its performance in Kerala and West Bengal elections.
The session is also taking place a month after the Modi government completed two years in power, saying that the country is changing under the dispensation. There are indications that the session will start on July 18 and continue till August 13 but a final decision on the dates will be taken tomorrow. 45 bills are pending in Rajya Sabha. Lok Sabha has 5 bills pending before it.
The bills pending in Rajya Sabha include the contentious Constitution (One Hundred and Twenty-second Amendment) Bill, 2014, known as the GST Bill, which was moved in the Upper House in August last year after being passed by Lok Sabha. The government is hopeful of the passage of the GST bill in this session amid indications that a number of regional parties have broken ranks with Congress on the issue and are willing to extend their support to this crucial economic reform measure.
Another key bill is the Whistle Blowers Protection (Amendment) Bill, 2015, which was moved in December last year but the discussion on it had remained inconclusive. In the Budget session this year, this bill could not be taken up. In Lok Sabha, important bills pending include the Consumer Protection Bill 2015 and the Benami Transactions (Prohibition) Amendment Bill, 2015.
The government will also push for clearing a bill, which seeks to replace an Ordinance to amend the Enemy Property Act as well as a bill to replace the Ordinance on the National Eligibility-cum Entrance Test (NEET). The last few sessions of Parliament have seen sparrings even though the second part of the Budget session recorded a relative improvement as far the completion of government business was concerned. But the problem of pending bills is not limited to the two years of the NDA government.
