The Budget session of Parliament is unlikely to be adjourned sine die as scheduled on Thursday, 2 April, news agencies reported on Wednesday.
The government is planning to extend the session by 2 to 3 days in the third week of April to bring a bill to increase the number of Lok Sabha seats to 816, the agencies said. The idea is to have at least 273 seats in Lok Sabha (33 per cent) reserved for women, news agency PTI said, quoting sources.
The budget session, which started on 28 January, was supposed to end on 2 April. The government will convene the session for two to three days, but not this week. The extra days will be held in the third week of April, meaning there won’t be a sitting on Friday, PTI said.
According to government thinking, on Thursday the chair of both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha is likely to adjourn the respective houses and announce that they will meet on a specific date, the agency said.
“The House will not be adjourned sine die but will be adjourned with the announcement that it will meet again on a specific date. We will meet again very soon, in this month itself,” a source told PTI, indicating the third week of April is the possible period of the two-three-day sittings.
However, there is no official word on the government’s plans.
During the extended period, the government is expected to table the Constitution amendment bill that will tweak the Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam, commonly known as the women’s reservation law, in Parliament.
Last fortnight, Union Home Minister Amit Shah discussed the plan with some NDA constituents and some non-Congress opposition floor leaders. But consultations with the principal opposition party, Congress, and another major party, TMC, were yet to take place.
The provision for 33 per cent reservation for women in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies was introduced by amending the Constitution in 2023, but it will come into effect after the completion of the delimitation exercise.
According to the broad contours available, the number of Lok Sabha seats would be increased from the present 543 to 816, with 273 seats reserved for women. The reservation will also be done in a “vertical basis” with seats allocated for SCs and STs. The redrawing of constituencies will be based onthe 2011 census rather than the proposed 2027 census.
A similar exercise will be carried out for state assemblies, with seats reserved on a pro rata basis.
While a Constitution amendment bill will tweak the Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam, commonly known as the women’s reservation law, another ordinary bill will amend the Delimitation Act.
Once approved by Parliament, the proposed laws will come into force on March 31, 2029, and will help reserve seats for women in the next Lok Sabha elections and in assembly elections in Odisha, Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, and Andhra Pradesh.
In September 2023, President Droupadi Murmu gave her assent to the Nari Shakti Vandan Bill. The law is officially known as the Constitution (106th Amendment) Act.
Bout the reservations were to become operational after the delimitation and census exercises were completed. The government, according to reports, has been considering amending the women quota law to implement it without the delimitation and census exercises.
Congress says Govt to ‘bulldoze’ a bill in Parliament
Earlier in the day, the Congress claimed that the Union government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi is proposing to ‘bulldoze’ a bill in Parliament that seeks to increase the size of the Lok Sabha by 50 per cent.
The number of seats allocated to each state is also proposed to be increased by 50 per cent, and such a move would ‘disadvantage’ smaller states in the South, the Northeast and the West, the party said.
Congress general secretary in charge of communications, Jairam Ramesh, said Telangana Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy has already raised an alarm over the issue, and others may very well follow as this proposal becomes officially public.
The Modi government is proposing to bulldoze a Bill to increase the size of the Lok Sabha by 50%.
“The Modi government is proposing to bulldoze a Bill to increase the size of the Lok Sabha by 50%. The number of seats allocated to each state is also proposed to be increased by 50%,” Ramesh claimed on X.
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