PANAJI, June 15:
Speaker of Lok Sabha Om Birla said on Thursday that longer and in-depth discussions in assemblies and Parliament lead to better legislations.
He was addressing an event on ‘Vikasit Bharat 2047’ in the Goa Assembly.
Opposition parties, however, skipped the event, with the Congress questioning why Birla was not giving a chance to party leader Rahul Gandhi to represent himself over his disqualification in a defamation case.
“It is always better that laws are passed after extensive and proper debates,” Birla told MLAs from the coastal state at the programme.
He stressed that the debates in assemblies and Parliament should be non-political and unbiased.
“At times, I feel that in the legislative assemblies, rather than discussing people’s issues and finding the solution, there is a tendency to oppose everything,” he said.
Birla said agreement and disagreement are the essence of India’s democracy.
“It is the speciality of our democracy that we can criticise the policies of the government,” he said, appealing to the elected members to ensure that discussions on the floor of the House represent the aspiration of the people.
“That is why in the House, there should be discussions on the action of the government,” he said. While passing laws, Birla said, there should be detailed and in-depth discussions and debates. “Every government frames laws for the welfare of people and gives them the rights. When laws are framed, there should be extensive, in-depth debates and discussions,” he said.
“The more there is debate and discussion over legislations, we will have better laws,” the Speaker said.
Birla also hailed the Goa Assembly for holding longer sessions of more than 40 days, as he expressed concerns over shorter Assembly sessions in many states.
“Despite being a small state, Goa has discussions, debates and dialogues leading towards policies for the welfare of the people,” he said.
The speaker said that all the elected representative bodies, from panchayat to assemblies, should be made accountable to the people.
“If Goa implements all the schemes in its respective constituencies, it can achieve the parameters under the sustainable development goals by 2030,” he said.
Birla said that if the Goa government works on fulfilling the aspirations of the people, the coastal state will lead the country in achieving the goal of Vikasit Bharat by 2047.
Opposition members, those from the Congress, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the Goa Forward Party (GFP) and the Revolutionary Goans Party (RGP), boycotted the function. Leader of Opposition Yuri Alemao called the move a mark of protest.
Talking to reporters at the entrance of the Assembly complex, Alemao said that they protested against Birla for not giving Congress leader Rahul Gandhi a chance to represent himself in the Lok Sabha in a 2019 criminal defamation case over his “Modi surname” remark.
In March this year, a court in Gujarat’s Surat convicted Gandhi in a criminal defamation case over his “Modi surname” remark and sentenced him to two years in jail. The decision led to his disqualification as a Member of Parliament. He represented the Wayanad Lok Sabha seat in Kerala. (PTI)
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