A CWC member told this correspondent Monday he has already written a letter to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi urging her not to support the GST Bill. Prime Minister Narendra Modi reached out to the main Opposition on November 27 for the first time in the last 18 months to seek its support. He had a 45-minute discussion with Mrs Gandhi and Dr Manmohan Singh on the issue.
The Congress is assessing whether the government is really serious about passing the bill or wants to blame the Opposition. “Manmohan Singh had already held two meetings with Narendra Modi on GST but that does not mean we are supporting the bill,” Congress insiders said. Over 90 members in the RS — from the Congress, AIADMK, Left and some one-member parties — have strong reservations on GST. The government managers who had floated the idea of calling a joint sitting of Parliament to pass the Land Bill are speaking of consensus because the ruling front is in a minority in the RS.
Meanwhile, acknowledging that the Opposition has a majority in the Rajya Sabha, parliamentary affairs minister Venkaiah Naidu flagged the importance of collaborative parliamentary democracy and expressed happiness over the relative calm in Parliament in the last three days of the session, contrary to earlier speculation about the opposite.
“The meeting between the Prime Minister and the Congress president has been widely welcomed across the country. This response is a clear indication that people strongly want collaborative parliamentary democracy and not confrontationist politics. This is also a clear indication that people want Parliament to deliver on matters that concern their life and aspirations. I hope that this spirit of collaborative functioning of Parliament will continue to prevail for the larger good,” he said.
