NEW DELHI: The sixth session of the 17th Lok Sabha was adjourned sine die two days before schedule, logging in the third best legislative business record and also the maximum hours lost due to pandemonium caused by the government-Opposition showdown over the Pegasus snooping row.
This denied Prime Minister Narendra Modi the chance to introduce newly inducted ministers, while he was seen largely staying away from the House despite being in the national capital.
The treasury benches drew the consolation that unlike the BJP forcing a full washout of the session in the wake of the alleged 2G spectrum allocation scam, the Opposition couldn’t disrupt the two Houses fully.
The Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha returned to normalcy during discussions on the Constitution (127) Amendment Bill.
The Lok Sabha lost 74 hours and 46 minutes of business schedule due to the deadlock over Pegasus. In the past five sessions in the 17th Lok Sabha, the House had a cumulative loss of only about 40 hours.
Yet, Lok Sabha was on an overdrive in its legislative business, allowing introduction of 13 bills and passing 20 such proposals amid the pandemonium, with most passed within a few minutes without any discussion and mere reading out of the statement of intent by the concerned ministers.
The heat on the ruling BJP remained intense during the session, with even the fence-sitters in the House showing their disappointment with the passage of the bills amid the din.
Except for the JD (U), the BJP is now without any large ally in the NDA.Despite agreeing for discussions on three topics — issues arising out of the passage of the three farm laws, Covid-19 pandemic and price rise of petroleum products — the Lok Sabha failed to see MPs raising any of the public concerns.