NEW DELHI: The Congress has decided to repeat its lawmakers M Veerappa Moily and Shashi Tharoor as chairmen of the key parliamentary standing committees on finance and external affairs respectively.
According to sources, the Congress has sent letters of recommendation for both Moily and Tharoor to continue as chairmen of the two panels for 2017-18. Though the two panels should have been reconstituted by September 1, a decision is expected soon, said these sources.
Earlier, there were doubts that the Congress was having a rethink on Moily as there was a delay in sending his name but there was an afterthought that the move could backfire given the high stake Karnataka assembly polls next year.
Moily is a veteran of Karnataka and has been chief minister in the state where the Congress is desperately trying to hold on to power.
Under Moily’s tenure in the past one year, the key finance committee was on many occasion sharply divided over the controversial demonetisation decision of the government. The finance panel produced 49 reports in the past one year.
The delay in sending Moily’s name by the Congress had caused some unease among the other opposition lawmakers. “The reply of the RBI Governor on demonetisation has not been ciculated to the members as the new panel has not been reconstituted,” an opposition lawmaker told The New Indian Express on condition of anonymity.
According to Congress sources, former prime minister Manmohan Singh, a member of the finance committee, had supported a second term for Moily, who represents Chikaballapur constituency in the Lok Sabha.
Tharoor, a second term Lok Sabha member from Thiruvananthapuram constituency in Kerala, too has been renominated as chairman of the parliamentary standing committee on external affairs for 2017-18 given his professional expertise and the rapport he enjoys with most members of the panel, including those of the ruling BJP.
Tharoor is a former UN diplomat and has served as a minister of state for external affairs in the previous UPA regime.
The panel produced 16 reports in the past one year, the latest one being on India-Pakistan relations.