Waqf Bill: Oppn members of JPC to boycott next round of meetings

Kolkata: Alleging high-handedness and arbitrary action of the chairman of the JPC on the Waqf Amendment Bill, Trinamool Congress MP Kalyan Banerjee on Thursday said opposition members of the Joint Parliamentary Committee will boycott the next round of meetings beginning November 9.

Banerjee, a member of the JPC on the Waqf Amendment Bill, said the chairman of the JPC, BJP's Jagdambika Pal, has fixed a hectic schedule of meetings in Guwahati, Bhubaneswar, Kolkata, Patna and Lucknow over six days, with Sunday being a holiday in between.

All the opposition members of the JPC have decided to boycott the tour and its meetings as the chairman is working in an arbitrary and high-handed manner, Banerjee told reporters at a press conference jointly addressed with party MP Nadimul Haque at the Press Club here.

He said the future course of action will be decided jointly by the members of the opposition.

Banerjee said the opposition members of the JPC met the Lok Sabha Speaker on November 5 and sought deferment of the schedule and also reduction in the number of days of meetings of the JPC from two days a week to one day a week or two consecutive days every fortnight.

He said the Speaker had verbally agreed to sympathetically consider their demands and speak to the chairman, but nothing happened thereafter.

Banerjee also alleged that the process in which the chairman of the committee was proceeding was violative of well-established parliamentary norms.

He also alleged that the members belonging to the ruling dispensation were working as per their own agenda and "not in the interest of the nation".

Stating that the members, as MPs, also have other important official work and have to attend to their constituencies, Banerjee said that the hectic schedule of meetings of the JPC -- two days a week, was affecting those.

"Waqf property stakeholders are not being given enough time percentage-wise, while organisations having no stake with the Waqf Amendment Bill are being called to meetings," he said.

A meeting of the Joint Committee on Waqf Bill took a dramatic turn on October 22 when Banerjee smashed a glass water bottle and threw it away during a heated exchange of words with BJP's Abhijit Gangopadhyay.

The TMC MP was suspended for one day from the parliamentary committee on Waqf for unruly conduct.

Banerjee, a senior advocate, had hurt his thumb and index finger and had to be given first aid.

The committee, chaired by Pal, was listening to the views of a group of retired judges and lawyers when the opposition members questioned what was their stake in the bill.�