Over 170 amendments weigh down the anti-graft legislation.
After its Mumbai flop show, Team Anna is no longer holding a gun on Parliament for a deadline to pass the Lokpal Bill, and thus the version as passed by the Lok Sabha ran into a hurdle race in the Rajya Sabha in the form of more than 170 amendments.
Putting the rickety UPA numbers through a stern test, its own temperamental ally Trinamool Congress (TMC), and almost all the opposition parties moved a series of amendments that would change the entire bill. As of 11pm on Thursday, there were indications that the bill would not be voted upon because the government was not sure it had the numbers. It will be deferred till the next session of the Rajya Sabha.
Right from the time the debate kicked off with leader of opposition Arun Jaitley’s frontal attack on the constitutionality of the bill, its methodology, and the over arching influence of the government in the appointment and removal of the Lokpal, its fate hung in balance.
The government was prepared for this assault, but it had reckoned that it would be able to persuade TMC to vote for the bill. With Union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee making all out efforts to win over the TMC, there was some hope that the bill may pass muster in the house of elders too.
However, the feisty Mamta Banerjee, who demonstrated her clout by forcing the UPA-2 to press the pause button on the decision to allow 51% foreign direct investment in the retail sector, was in no mood to relent on the issue of state’s autonomy. The element of competitive politics being injected by her state rival CPI-M also dictated the hardline stance of the TMC.
The government had a simple numerical majority in the Lok Sabha, but still it had to depend on abstentions from the BSP, SP and RJD for the smooth passage of the bill, but in the Rajya Sabha it has never had even a simple majority, and the task was doubly difficult. It was banking on similar abstentions from the same parties in the Lok Sabha, but all these parties through fiery oratory made it clear that they would not grant bailout to the government in the house of elders.
“If we back anything that remotely supports the Congress we shall not have any face in the Uttar Pradesh elections,” said a Samajwadi MP while defending the decision to refrain from abstention in this vote. It was also obvious that the government side was not keen on putting its best defence forward in the house of elders, as if it was reconciled to the Lokpal bill going into a limbo.
Firstly, prime minister Manmohan Singh was not present in the House when the debate was to be initiated, and then frontline cabinet ministers, who sat on the front benches, also did not rise in support of the bill. Union minister of state for parliamentary affairs Rajiv Shukla did make a strong attempt to rebut the opposition criticism, but then the
weight of seniority was missing.
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