Rajya Sabha adjourned till 2 pm following Congress ruckus over President's Rule in Uttarakhand.
Second half of the Budget session, which began on Monday, witnessed a stormy affair with government and opposition closing ranks over imposition of President's Rule in Uttarakhand.
Backed by the Left, JD(U) and other opposition parties, Congress cornered the Centre over the imposition of President's rule in Uttarakhand and Arunachal Pradesh.
Opposition leaders stormed into the well of the House, raising slogans against Modi government and demanded discussion on Uttarakhand issue.
Amid uproar, Rajya Sabha has been adjourned till 2 pm.
The Uttarakhand issue has also dominated the all-party meeting called by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan on Sunday. The government’s floor managers had decided to brazen it out and hit back on the Uttarakhand issue by citing specific cases of the use of Article 356 by successive governments in the past. The Congress had made it clear that it would seek a discussion on the contentious issue despite the government’s claim that the matter, being sub-judice, cannot be deliberated upon. Congress president Sonia Gandhi, who had held discussions with select party leaders during a strategy meeting on the Uttarakhand crisis, had suggested that the party take an aggressive stand on this issue.
The government has also listed a heavy agenda for the session, including passage of 13 bills in the Lok Sabha and 11 bills in the Rajya Sabha. Government floor managers, however, are unlikely to push for contentious measures like the Goods and Sevices Tax (GST) Bill in the first few days. Financial business, including discussion in the Lok Sabha on demands for grants of various ministries and the working of some ministries in the Rajya Sabha, consideration and passing of the Railways Appropriation Bill, 2016, and Finance Bill of 2016, constitute the main agenda of this session.
A discussion on the prevailing drought situation in many parts of India is another issue that all parties want discussed.
Apart from the Uttarakhand issue, the Congress will also target the government over imposition of President’s Rule in Arunachal Pradesh, the Ishrat Jahan case, drought management and alleged communalisation of educational institutes.
During the 15 sittings of the session, besides ratification of the presidential proclamation in Uttarakhand under Article 356 of the Constitution, two ordinances — the Uttarakhand Appropriation (Vote on Account) Ordinance, 2016, and The Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Second Ordinance, 2016, are also on the agenda.
