Parliament must use budget session to discuss key pending bills The budget session of Parliament begins today. The last few sessions have been characterised by disruptions and consequent loss of productive time. To see one indicator, the 15th Lok Sabha, half-way through its term, has lost 30 per cent of scheduled time — the worst ever. As a result, many important bills have been pending. It is to be seen whether...

At the peak of Anna Hazare’s fast in Delhi last year, some of his former aides in Maharashtra had cautioned that he should not get carried away by the hype. Last week, at Mumbai’s thinly populated MMRDA Grounds where his latest agitation flopped, there were a few lessons for Hazare and his team. One being: never take people for granted. Some of Hazare’s former associates suggest that the craze that the Lokpal...

Among the demands of the CPM, one of the fiercest critics of the government’s version of the Lokpal Bill, a key one is the inclusion of all government employees under the purview of the Lokpal. Yet, in states that the party rules or has ruled, the Lokayukta Acts passed by CPM governments don’t give the institute such a reach. In Tripura, the government passed a Lokayukta Act a year ago, leaving out...

The Assembly elections this year, followed by squabbles and tussles between the ruling Trinamool Congress and the CPM at various gram panchayats and panchayat samitis after the regime change, have spelt doom for the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme in West Bengal. In the seven months from April 1 to October 31, only 19 days of jobs could be given to 2.55 lakh families and 4.17 crore mandays could...

Preparing to fulfil one of the main demands of Anna Hazare, the UPA government is in the process of finalising the draft legislation for the Citizens Charter whereby every citizen will have the right to time-bound delivery of goods and services. Titled Citizens Charter for Committed Supply of Goods and Provision of Services by Public Authorities Bill, 2011, the draft legislation provides for multi-layered grievance redressal mechanism from panchayat to national...