New Delhi: The Winter Session of Parliament, which began on November 29 in the shadow of uncertainty with the suspension of 12 Rajya Sabha MPs in the previous session, came to an end on Wednesday, a day earlier than scheduled, with the passage of 11 Bills in both Houses.
While the government projected it as a success – with 82 per cent productivity in Lok Sabha and 48 per cent in Rajya Sabha – despite the "disruptive strategy" of the Opposition, the treasury benches have been accused of "rushing the Bills without debates and even prior notice".
The session had 18 sittings in 24 days, said Parliamentary Affairs minister Pralhad Joshi, who was addressing the media after both the Houses were adjourned sine die.
Rajya Sabha was adjourned sine die on Wednesday with Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu lamenting that the Upper House functioned much below its potential due to repeated disruptions.
Soon after laying of listed papers and reports, Naidu said he was not happy to share with members that the House functioned "much below its potential".
"I urge all of you to... reflect and introspect if this session could have been different and better. I don't want to speak elaborately on the course of the session that would lead me to make a very critical view," he said.
Later, Naidu said there is a need to inculcate legislative temper in our politicians. "We should not only develop a scientific temper but I feel now we must inculcate legislative temper in our politicians, this is the need of the hour. As I am presiding over the Upper House I see what is happening.... Vijay Raghavan (Principal Scientific Advisor) should come up with some scientific invention to help our politicians with legislative temper," he said speaking at the inauguration of celebration of birth centenaries of inspirational scientists by Vigyan Prasar.
Naidu said the purpose of legislators is to legislate and "discuss, debate and decide, not disrupt".
"This should be a guide, principle for any. On one side we are making progress on the other some of our selected representatives are making a mockery of the institutions.
This has to be corrected at the earliest and this has to be done by the political leaders and also the opinion creators. People who perform better should be appreciated, reported and supported. People who damn the system need to be damned," he said.
The Lok Sabha was adjourned sine die too on Wednesday, bringing an end to the Winter Session of Parliament that saw Op-position protests on issues such as price rise and the Lakhimpur Kheri violence.
During the session, the House saw the passage of nine Bills which included the Farm Laws Repeal Bill, the Election Laws (Amendment) Bill and legislations to fix the tenure of directors of the Enforcement Directorate and CBI at five years and supplementary demands for grants.
Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla read out the valedictory remarks as soon as the House assembled for the day.
Birla told reporters that agreements and disagreements on issues may be reflected in debates and not through disruptions.
Noting that smooth conduct of the House is the responsibility of all stakeholders, Birla said it must be run in accordance with the collective will and consensus.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home minister Amit Shah, Congress president Sonia Gandhi were among those present in the House on the last day of the Winter Session.
The Lok Sabha had 18 sittings during the session which lasted for 83 hours and 12 minutes. Debates on COVID-19 and climate change were held during the session lasting 12 hours 26 minutes and six hours and 26 minutes respectively. While 99 members participated in the debate on the pandemic, the discussion on climate change, which remained inconclusive, saw the participation of 61 members.
The Lok Sabha Speaker said the House lost 18 hours and 48 minutes to disruptions, but saw productivity zoom to 204 per cent on December 2, when the issue of the pandemic was taken up for discussion. The overall productivity of the Lok Sabha was 82 per cent, Birla said.
Addressing a joint press conference, Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge, Leader of Congress in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and party's chief whip in the Upper House Jairam Ramesh accused the government of throttling the voice of the Opposition to prevent them from raising issues of public importance.
"The intention of the government was to get their Bills passed urgently in the din and without a discussion. They wanted to fulfil their agenda," Kharge said.
He claimed that while the UPA has 68 members in the Rajya Sabha along with 50 of other opposition parties and 2 Independents, the opposition strength is 120 members and 118 for the NDA.
He alleged that the government did not want a division as they were in a minority and with this in mind, they suspended 12 MPs on the very first day of the Winter session.
"Their purpose was to manufacture a majority and they found this way of suspending members for their acts in the last session. This was a conspiracy on the part of the government to get their key legislations passed as part of their agenda and not face any issues of farmers, price rise, unemployment, Lakhimpur Kheri incident," he alleged.
"We have done no mistake and it is the government which has committed the mistake, deliberately, as they did not have a majority in the Upper House and they feared their Bills would fall."
TMC floor leader in Rajya Sabha Derek O'Brien also alleged that the government has tried to manufacture a majority in the Upper House by suspending 12 MPs. Under this dispensation, democracy is being mocked at and dismantled every day. They are giving slow poison to Parliament," O'Brien, who was suspended from the House on Tuesday, told reporters.