Legislation prime task but only 21 Private Bills by 64 MLAs

Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Dec 27: Though prime duty of legislators is debate, discussion and, if consensus emerged, pass legislations in the Assembly, the business available before the Lower House after expiry of deadline showed far less number of bills have been submitted by the MLAs as compared to the prescribed limit. Not only the bills or resolutions, even the number of questions given by the MLAs was also significantly down from the limit.
Official figures available with the Excelsior revealed that the Assembly Secretariat has received only 21 Private Members’ Bills for upcoming 40-day budget session of the Legislature, beginning January 2 as against the entitlement of 320. Every MLA is entitled to submit five Private Members’ Bills. Sixty-four MLAs in the House of 89 can submit bills, resolutions and questions while rest are Ministers, Presiding Officers and Vice Chairpersons, who were not eligible for raising such queries.
Sources said only about a dozen MLAs have submitted the Private Member’s Bills while more than 50 others have not given even a single legislation for discussion and passing in the Legislative Assembly though making legislations is said to be prime task of the Legislature.
This, however, is not for the first time when the Legislative Assembly has received such a small number of Private Members’ Bills. Previously also, it has been observed that very few MLAs had been submitting Private Members’ Bills in the Assembly.
The Assembly had exclusively reserved two days for taking up Private Members’ Bills.
Sources said 37 old Private Members’ Bills were still pending in the Assembly at various stages including introduction, consideration and passing. With 21 new bills tabled by the members, a total of 58 bills would be taken up in the budget session for two days.
Almost similar is the case with Private Members’ Resolution.
The Legislative Assembly has received only 97 Private Members’ Resolutions. Here also, every MLA is entitled to submit at least four Private Members’ Resolutions, which are debated and, if majority approved, passed in the House. Six old Private Members’ Resolutions are also pending at various stages, which will take their total number to 103.
The legislators were entitled to submit 256 Private Members’ Resolutions. The Assembly has reserved two days for debate and their approval, rejection or withdrawal.
The Legislative Assembly has received only 1100 questions for the budget session as against the maximum limit of 1280.
Each MLA is entitled to submit 20 questions in the budget session—10 each in starred and un-starred categories. While starred questions are debated during Question Hour and their replies given by the concerned Ministers, the MLAs get only written answers for the un-starred questions.
Though Legislative Assembly Speaker Kavinder Gupta had fixed December 20 deadline for submission of questions, Private Members’ Bills and Private Members Resolutions for the MLAs, he even relaxed the deadline for the questions as couple of MLAs claimed that they were outside the State and couldn’t prepare their queries in time. However, even after relaxation of the deadline, the number of questions reached 1100. Till deadline, which was December 20, the number was 1000 only, sources said.
As per the Legislative Assembly calendar, three days have been reserved for Government bills and two days each for Private Members’ Bills and Private Members’ Resolutions.
Budget session of the Legislature will begin on January 2 with Governor NN Vohra’s Address to Joint Session of the Legislature while Finance Minister Dr Haseeb Drabu will present budget in the Assembly on January 11. There will be 26 sittings in the Assembly in 40-day session, which will culminate on February 10.

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