Upsetting the UPA plan to opt for the ordinance route to enact the National Food Security Bill, the pet project of Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Opposition leader in the Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj on Sunday said her party preferred advancement of the monsoon session of Parliament.
Sushma said the BJP was not opposed to a proposal to hold a special session of Parliament to pass the Bill and said the legislation should not be implemented as an ordinance.
“There are media reports that the Centre is considering the option of an ordinance or to convene a special session of Parliament. The ordinance route for such an important legislation is not desirable,” the BJP leader tweeted on the social networking site Twitter.
“We are not opposed to a special session of Parliament. However, the better option will be to prepone the monsoon session which is anyway due in July,” she tweeted. The UPA had been trying to enact the Food Bill at the earliest as they could use it as a showpiece in the coming elections. Food Minister K V Thomas had moved the Food Security Bill saying it was a key UPA legislation that would give the right to subsidised grain to around 67 per cent of the population.
But the Centre failed to do it as Parliament session saw repeated disruptions by Opposition parties over the allocation of coal blocks and 2G spectrum.