The Congress on Sunday questioned the delay in formally proroguing the Monsoon session of Parliament and asked whether Union Home Minister Amit Shah was still looking for a "tainted" two-thirds majority to get a delimitation-linked Constitutional amendment bill passed in a special session.
Both the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha were adjourned sine die on August 13, but the Houses are yet to be formally prorogued.
Congress general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh said the gap between adjournment sine die and prorogation is generally two to four days, though there have been instances when both occurred on the same day.
"Ten days have gone by since this Lok Sabha was adjourned sine die but still there is no information on its prorogation," Ramesh said in a post on X.
He acknowledged that the gap was 28 days after the 2015 Monsoon session and 20 days in 2021, but said, "But there were no diabolical moves afoot then."
"What explains the abnormal delay now? Is the Union Home Minister still in search of his tainted 2/3rd majority to get the Constitutional Amendment Bill on Delimitation passed in a Special Session?" Ramesh said.
He also shared an excerpt from M N Kaul and S L Shakdher's Practice and Procedure of Parliament, which explains that prorogation is the formal termination of a parliamentary session by an order of the President under Article 85(2), acting on the advice of the Prime Minister.
The Congress had earlier claimed that the opposition's "success" had prevented the government from securing the required two-thirds majority to bring the delimitation-linked Constitutional amendment bill.
"They don't have a two-thirds majority and will never get it," Ramesh had said after both Houses were adjourned sine die.
The issue of delimitation has remained a major political flashpoint, with the Congress last week demanding that the Lok Sabha's existing strength of 543 seats be frozen for the next 25 years and that 33 per cent reservation for women be implemented from the 2029 Lok Sabha elections.
The demands were reiterated at a meeting of the Congress Working Committee (CWC), which also called for maintaining the present allocation of Lok Sabha seats among states for the next 25 years.
"The Congress Working Committee reinforces its demand that the constitutional freeze on the current strength of the Lok Sabha and its present allocation among the states be extended for the next 25 years, while one-third reservation for women be implemented from the 2029 Lok Sabha elections itself," the CWC resolution said.
The Congress has also accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of using the women's reservation issue to push its delimitation agenda, calling his appeal to opposition parties to support the proposed bill a "drama" and alleging that his focus was "Modi preservation, not women's reservation".
During the Budget session on April 17, the government's Constitution Amendment Bill linked to delimitation and women's reservation failed to secure the required two-thirds majority in the Lok Sabha.
Of the 528 MPs who voted, 298 supported the bill while 230 opposed it. The legislation needed 352 votes to clear the constitutional amendment threshold.
(With inputs from PTI)