The Congress will head five of the 24 parliamentary panels but its request for chairing standing committee on human resource development was turned down by the government. Instead the Congress was given the high-profile committee on home affairs while the BJP will head the HRD panel.
The Congress will also head the crucial finance committee, in which former prime minister Manmohan Singh will be a member. The panel will be headed by former union minister M Veerappa Moily. P Bhattacharya will head the home panel.
Senior BJP leader LK Advani, the oldest member in Lok Sabha, will be a member of the parliamentary committee on information technology, which will be headed by his party member Anurag Thakur. The members also include actors Jaya Bachchan, Rekha, Hema Malini, cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar, BJP leader Varun Gandhi and Trinamool Congress's Derek O Brien.
Parliamentary affairs minister M Venkaiah Naidu described the choice of members of the panels as a "fine blend of experience and young talent." He said that certain committees like finance, railways, urban affairs and had been allocated to parties on their request. However, the Congress, according to party sources, wanted to head the standing committee on HRD. BJP's JP Nadda has been given chairmanship of the HRD and Sports panel, which was headed by the Congress under the UPA regime.
BJP ally Shiv Sena's Anandrao Adsul will chair the committee on chemicals and fertilisers. Another Maharashtra MP, BJP's Hansraj Ahir who was in the forefront of the campaign to expose irregularities in coal block allocations, will head the standing committee on coal.
The standing committee on external affairs will be headed by former minister Shashi Tharoor. Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi will be its member, while Congress President Sonia Gandhi, who was a member in the HRD and sports committee, does not figure in any of the panels. The party has also got chairmanship of panels on science and technology, which will be headed by Ashwani Kumar, and Law and Personnel to be chaired by EM Sudarsana Natchiappan.
Among the BJP veterans is also former union minister and Uttarakhand chief minister BC Khanduri who will head the committee on defence. Khanduri, 79, was not included in Narendra Modi's under 75 council of ministers. BJP's Rajiv Pratap Rudy, who did not get a berth in the government, will head the panel on energy.
Among the non-NDA parties, Trinamool Congress members K D Singh will head committee on Transport and former Railway Minister Dinesh Trivedi Railways. BJD member Pinaki Mishra will chair panel on Urban Development, AIADMK's P Venugopal Rural Development, BSP's Satish Chandra Misra Health and JD-U's K C Tyagi Commerce and Industry.
Other BJP leaders who have got chairmanship of the panels include Chandan Mitra (Commerce), Hukum Deo Narayan Yadav (agriculture), Virendra Kumar (labour), Prahlad Joshi (petroleum), Hukum Singh (water resources), Hansraj Ahir (coal) and Ramesh Bais (social justice).
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