india

Updated: Nov 18, 2019 10:21 IST

The Winter Session of Parliament will start on Monday as the government will seek to pass more than 30 bills amid the opposition’s plan to raise the detention of political leaders in Jammu and Kashmir, a slowing economy, rising unemployment and farmers’ distress among others.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government has officially informed Parliament that it wants to amend the Citizenship Act in the upcoming session, a move that could trigger protests by several opposition parties.

The planned Citizenship Amendment Bill provides for Indian citizenship to be granted to non-Muslims of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh.

The bill figures in the tentative list of 35 bills the parliamentary affairs ministry has sent to the legislative branch of the Lok Sabha.

The list, provided by the Lok Sabha secretariat, also includes the industrial relations code — one of the four labour reforms — and the proposal to replace two ordinances on banning e-cigarettes and lowering corporate tax rates.

The winter session of Parliament will open with obituary references to two members of the Upper House — former Union ministers Arun Jaitley and Ram Jethmalani — and former external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj.

There will be 20 sittings in this session which will end on December 13.

The Winter Session also marks the historic 250th session of the Rajya Sabha and will be marked through discussions and the release of a commemorative coin, postal stamp and books.

A number of meetings were held ahead of the session as political leaders discussed issues they wished to debate.

There were four meetings on Sunday.

One was an all-party meeting comprising MPs from both houses called by parliamentary affairs minister Pralhad Joshi and the second was of Rajya Sabha members by vice-president and Upper House chairperson Venkaiah Naidu.

The third was a meeting of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and the fourth of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) parliamentary party executive.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi attended his second all-party meeting in as many days on Sunday and advised members of the treasury benches to take the lead in discussions.

“He said his government will work together with all parties in a constructive manner to address pending legislations and frame policy solutions for specific issues related to environment and pollution, the economy, the agricultural sector and farmers, and the rights of women, youth and the less privileged sections of society,” parliamentary affairs minister Pralhad Joshi said.

Modi also emphasised that “the 250th session of the Upper House provided a unique opportunity for highlighting the unique strengths of the Indian Parliament as well as the Indian Constitution, in providing an overarching framework of governance institutions for a diverse country like India,” a release said.

Before that, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla had on Saturday appealed to all political parties for cooperation for ensuring smooth functioning of the House.

Opposition parties had said they will seek answers from the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government over a slowing economy, growing unemployment and farm distress during the session.

The Budget Session of Parliament, the first for the second term of the Modi government, had ended on a high note with the effective scrapping of Article 370, enactment of a law to bifurcate Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories, and approval of the landmark triple talaq bill.

It was the most productive inaugural session of a new Lok Sabha since Independence, data showed.

Thirty bills, including the financial legislations that are part of the budget, were cleared by both Houses, the highest in any session in the past decade.

The Lok Sabha sat for more than 280 hours, often till evening, and cleared 36 bills, setting a new benchmark.