Bypassed, manipulated, ignored: How Modi govt has curtailed Parliamentary Committees

A few days after many politicians from opposition parties received a message from Apple warning of a state-sponsored attack on their mobile devices, Congress Member of Parliament (MP) Karti Chidambaram wrote to Prataprao Jadhav, Chairman of the Standing Committee on Communications and Information Technology, saying that Apple officials need to be summoned. But like many times in the past, there was no reply. Since the Modi government took over for the first time in 2014, the role and functions of Departmentally Related Standing Committees (DRSC) have been diluted and in many cases, made redundant. TNM looks at a slew of instances and measures put in place to undermine DRSCs. .In 2019, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg faced a volley of sharp questions by members of the United States House Financial Services Committee on a host of issues ranging from digital currency to political hate messaging using social media. But when the Information Technology (IT) committee of the Indian Parliament headed by Congress MP Shashi Tharoor was looking into use of social media for religious and political polarisation in 2021, the committee was not given permission to summon important global executives of giants like FaceBook and Twitter and could only summon the officials of these companies who were based in India and are Indian citizens. This curtailed the committee’s mandate as most of the Indian executives have limited decision making powers.But consent to summon citizens of other countries has not always been denied. For example, in 2019 when the same IT committee, headed by a BJP MP at that time, wanted to summon then Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, an American citizen, the Speaker permitted it. The intent of the IT chairperson Anurag Thakur was to ‘warn’ Twitter and other social media platforms against misuse of social media and interference in the upcoming Parliamentary elections.Departmentally Related Standing Committees or DRSCs are essential for the healthy functioning of a democracy and are watchdogs of India’s Parliament. While bills are tabled, discussed, and passed in the two houses of the Parliament, Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, it is the committees that scrutinise them threadbare. While in Parliament, with proceedings recorded and transmitted, MPs perform as per party directives, vote on bills as per party mandate (at least most times). But in the committees, away from the media glare and under a shroud of relative secrecy, MPs look at the bills closely, consult subject matter experts, and make recommendations to better the legislations proposed.The Indian Parliament has 24 DRSCs that also examine the performance of ministries and bureaucrats, and make recommendations. To do so, they have the power to summon officials, experts, and witnesses. While the recommendations of these committees are not binding on the government, traditionally they have been respected, and suggested changes, at least most of them, have been accommodated. The committees are made up of MPs from across party lines and have customarily been bipartisan. But all these norms have changed drastically since 2014. With a brute majority in Parliament, the ruling BJP has managed to strong-arm and pass most of the bills tabled, many a time without proper discussions.Committee chairpersons ‘managed’ Many of the committees, chaired by opposition MPs, asked tough questions, proposed changes, and demanded accountability on many tricky issues and have proven to be irritants for the current government. One ingenious way the ruling dispensation has found to create a favourable atmosphere in the committees is to regulate the chairs. And if there is an opposition MP who creates an uncomfortable situation, then change the chair, even if it is mid-term.In the case of Congress MP Shashi Tharoor, the government has used this course of action twice. Tharoor headed the External Affairs committee in the first term of the Modi government between 2014-2019.While there were many questions on foreign policy raised by the committee that made the government uncomfortable, the biggest issue was regarding the Doklam area and the committee’s questions on whether or not the area was conceded by India to China, how many Chinese soldiers are present in areas that were occupied by India, etc. Doklam is a disputed area on the Indo-Chinese border and in 2017-18, there were reports that the Chinese drastically increased their military presence in the 100-sq-feet area and also built infrastructure. Tharoor was removed and replaced with a BJP MP.“Since its formation, a member of the Opposition has chaired the committee on External Affairs, even when the opposition has been miniscule. External Affairs is an opportunity to demonstrate to the world that we speak as one country, one voice, and in national interest. After Tharoor chaired that committee, the BJP decided that he was far too inconvenient and for the first time in our history, decided to give the chairmanship to one of their own MPs,” a former member of the committee told TNM. The chairman of the committee now is BJP MP PP Chaudhary.In the past, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and IK Gujaral have chaired the committee, and so did Sushma Swaraj before she was appointed the Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha.“As a result, the committee no longer asks pertinent questions to the ministry and by extension, the Modi government,” the MP added.Tharoor was then appointed chair of the IT committee. During his tenure there, several major controversies were taken up by the committee including the Pegasus issue, data privacy, internet shutdowns, and other matters that were inconvenient to the BJP. “The committee summoned officers and witnesses and through that, asked tough questions of the government. Tharoor was finally moved out as the chair,” a former colleague of Tharoor from the committee said. Tharoor was replaced in 2022 by Jadhav, who is an MP from the Shiv Sena (Shinde faction), an ally of the BJP.From there, Tharoor has been shuffled to chair a committee that the government feels he cannot make much noise in – the Standing Committee on Chemicals and Fertilisers, a Congress leader said.“To give the principal opposition party – the Congress – only one chairmanship of the Lok Sabha committees, that too a relatively inconsequential one, speaks volumes to the disrespect of the government towards the Opposition and democracy,” the Congress leader added.Not allowing quorum When Tharoor did chair the IT committee and many contentious issues were raised by the committee, the BJP MPs present often refused to sign the attendance register, often resulting in a lack of quorum to adopt the resolutions passed. One such example was when the Pegasus spyware issue came up. Officials from the ministries of Home Affairs, Electronics and Information Technology, and the Department of Telecommunications were to be questioned on allegations that Pegasus was used by the Union Government to spy on nearly 300 persons, including opposition politicians, journalists, and activists.“On the said day, there were an equal number of ruling and opposition MPs. Tharoor decided to summon several government officials to question them. In the next few minutes, other BJP MPs from the committee who had rarely attended meetings before stormed into the room,” a member of the committee told TNM. “They insisted on raising issues other than Pegasus although they had not served notice prior for the same. But they refused to sign the attendance register so the quorum could not be formed,” the MP said. The IT committee has 31 members and the attendance of at least one-third of the members is required to form a quorum. Inflexibility Opposition MPs allege that the Modi government has been inflexible to any recommendations made by the committees. The MPs TNM spoke to said that in the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) period, there had been many instances of a bill being changed to accommodate the recommendations of committees.“During the UPA regime, constructive comments by committees on a bill would be taken by the minister and implemented. For example, on a major healthcare bill, when Ghulam Nabi Azad was the Union Health Minister, an opposition MP who was a doctor made valid suggestions. Azad decided not to table the bill, make amendments to reflect some of the suggestions, and then table it. Something like this has never happened since the BJP came to power in 2014,” a senior Congress MP who was a minister in UPA-II told TNM.The Congress MP alleged that the Modi government, from the very start in 2014, was reluctant, sometimes even adamant, to integrate any changes or suggestions from the DRSCs.“In 2014, when this government was formed, there was the Factories Law Act pending from the UPA time. An Opposition MP made a recommendation that companies of a certain size should be mandated to make workers aware of their rights both in writing and orally. When the bill came up for discussion, many BJP MPs too expressed their agreement with the recommendation,” an Opposition MP recalled.“But when it came to voting in favour of the said amendment, there was no flexibility from the ruling party MPs. The directive to do so was from above, so even though it was not part of any agenda or ideology of the party, it was not allowed to pass,” he added.Indefinite delays When a certain bill is sent to a standing committee, there is no stipulated time frame by when it has to be sent back to the ministry. And this loophole has been taken advantage of when the government faces a dilemma. For example, in 2021, the Women and Child Development Ministry under Smriti Irani sent the Prohibition of Child Marriage (Amendment) Bill, 2021 to the standing Committee on Education, Women, Children, Youth and Sports. While a section in the government pressed for an amendment in the law to increase the legal age of marriage for women from 18 to 21, there were many within the ruling party who opposed this move vehemently, a source in BJP said.“Many BJP MPs, especially from the Hindi belt where the party has strong presence, from states such as Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan, opposed the amendment, resulting in an impasse within the committee and the government,” the source said.To avoid this predicament and to do away with the issue, a strategy was arrived at – seeking multiple extensions. The committee sought at least eight extensions and the meetings are rarely held to examine the bill. The last meeting took place in May 2022 but Rajya Sabha Chairperson Jagdeep Dhankhar has obliged the committee with another extension, till January 2024, the BJP MP added. With elections in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh expected to be concluded by then, the pressure from leaders from these states on the government is expected to be less. Incidentally, this 31-member panel had just six women examining a crucial issue that greatly impacts women all over the country.Bills rushed through On August 11, 2023, the Union Home Minister Amit Shah tabled three bills – Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, Bhartiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita and Bharatiya Sakshya – that were to replace the Indian Penal Code (IPC), Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), and the Evidence Act. Despite the historic importance of this move and how it could alter the country’s criminal and justice system, the members of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs were given a total of 11 meetings over three months, to examine and give recommendations. The draft bill itself was given just five days before the committee was to adopt the bill, but after stiff opposition from Congress’ P Chidambaram and TMC’s Derek O’ Brien, the date was moved from October 27 to November 6. But the extension was not at all sufficient and the steps demanded by members of the INDIA alliance to understand the intricacies of the bill were ignored, MPs allege.Derek says that the Opposition MPs’ objections were based on the form and content of the draft bill. “But our objection is also on how they have gone about it. They have not consulted experts or stakeholders before drafting the bill,” he added.In a letter written to the chairman of the committee in October, Chidambaram and Derek had recommended that the members be allowed to hold consultations with the justices of the Supreme Court and the high courts, human rights organisations, members of the media, and with other experts on topics like cybercrime and juvenile justice. This was implemented and the bill was adopted with limited deliberations. Finally, when 10 members of the committee sought time to present individual, detailed dissent notes, it too was not allowed and a 70-page detailed dissent note was collectively submitted. The bill was adopted by the committee on November 6.Agree in person but don’t allow into record What transpires in meetings of parliamentary committees is expected not to be disclosed, neither to the public or media nor in the record of proceedings. This inherently has allowed for relatively unrestricted, bipartisan discussions even if it is against the party’s stated stance. Many BJP MPs have used the committee meetings to express their unvarnished opinions but have refused to allow them to be entered into the records, either for fear of being reprimanded by party seniors or to avoid embarrassing the party.A case in point was the discussion over BharatNet, a Union Government project to provide internet to rural parts of the country via optic fibre. In multiple meetings of the IT committee that was looking into the progress of the project, BJP MPs candidly agreed that villages in their constituencies have not benefited from the project as they should have. But when the time came to put it on record, they refused to make it official, fearing repercussions. Although this project was launched in 2011 under UPA-II, it is one of the pet projects of PM Modi as it’s a part of his larger digital India campaign. “BJP MPs did not wish to tarnish a project close to the PM’s heart with ground reality,” an MP present in the proceedings said.Parliamentary committees bypassed In August 2023, when Jairam Ramesh resigned as the chair of the Committee on Science and Technology Environment and Climate Change, he accused the Modi government of turning “yet another institutional mechanism worthless” and said that the DRSC was bypassed at the behest of the PM. He objected to amendments to three key laws – Forest Conservation Act, 1980, Biological Diversity Act, 2002, and the bill to set up the Anusandhan National Research Foundation – not being referred to the Environment and Climate Change committee but sent to a joint committee set up by the government to study these bills. The 31-member joint committee headed by BJP MP Rajendra Agarwal had an overwhelming number of BJP members and their allies and not a single member from the Congress. Just three of the 31 were from opposition parties.The Forest (Conservation) Amendment Bill, 2023 sought to redefine forests but several activists and conservationists had expressed concerns.Setting up a joint committee is one of the workarounds found by the Modi government to circumvent the parliamentary standing committees. In many cases where the head of a certain committee is a member of an opposition party and the scrutiny of a bill sent could ruffle feathers, a joint committee, which is formed in an ad hoc manner, is created with members and a chair of the government’s choosing.Numbers don’t lie With most MPs lacking the skill and support system to analyse bills, the role of a committee becomes imperative. But the number of bills being referred to the standing committees has dropped over the years. The decision of referring a bill tabled in the Parliament is the prerogative of the minister in charge.Between 2004-2009, that is the 14th Lok Sabha, 60% of bills were sent to standing committees and in the next term, between 2009-14 under the 15th Lok Sabha, that number went up to 71%. But in the very next term, under the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), the number of bills referred to committees dipped to a meagre 26%. The downward trend has continued in the 17th Lok Sabha with only 10% of the bills being sent for scrutiny to Parliamentary Committees.

Bypassed, manipulated, ignored: How Modi govt has curtailed Parliamentary Committees

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