THE Modi Government’s decision to hold the Winter Session of Parliament immediately after the results of the ongoing Assembly elections are announced is a measure of its supreme confidence in itself.
In the midst of the election process, for which votes will be counted on December 3, Union Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pralhad Joshi announced that the Winter Session will begin on December 4 and end on December 22.
The timing is significant as this would be the last session of Parliament before Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeks a third term in the national elections due early next year. It also reflects the sense of contentment of the Government in its performance during the past ten years.
“We won the previous two Lok Sabha elections with remarkably big majority and this time, we are confident of another historic landslide victory,” said BJP President JP Nadda recently.
The announcement of the session schedule manifests that the BJP wants to set the agenda for the Lok Sabha elections irrespective of the outcome of the state Assembly elections.
At the top of the session’s agenda are three historic Bills radically overhauling the colonial-era system of administration of criminal justice – the Indian Penal Code (IPC), Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC), and the Evidence Act.
The Bills had been introduced on September 22, the last day of the Special Session, to showcase PM Modi’s commitment to remove all vestiges of the British legacy. In that regard, the last session of the current Lok Sabha could create a new chapter in the history of post-Independence legislation in India.
After his historic laws on GST, abolition of triple talaq, and women’s reservation, the Winter Session might end up changing the very face of the criminal law imposed by the British. This would be something that no previous had achieved and could open the gates of more progressive and peoplefriendly laws that PM Modi has promised in his third term.
Government’s initiatives
While the Opposition would like to run down the Modi Government’s last ten years in power, the BJP is confident of winning the people’s trust with greater support on the basis of its track-record. The Government’s initiatives have lifted more than 13.5 crore Indians from the clutches of poverty and made India the world’s fastest-growing economy despite global downturn.
The report of the Lok Sabha Ethics Committee recommending expulsion of TMC MP Mahua Moitra for allegedly accepting bribes for asking questions in Parliament is bound to create an indefensible problem for the Opposition trying to forge what is seen by the people as “the unity of the corrupt.”
