Articles

Let Young MPs Light Up Parliament Which Has Become a “Deep, Dark Chamber”

Very happy with the news that Swati Maliwal, the young firebrand chief of the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW), has been nominated by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) as a candidate for election to Rajya Sabha. Maliwal (39), when elected, will be part of a small group of young MPs in Rajya Sabha who are in their 30s and early 40s.

This includes Jebi Mather from the Congress, AAP’s Raghav Chadha (35), and three of my colleagues from the Trinamool Congress.

One is Saket Gokhale (36), among India’s foremost RTI activists, who has also faced incarceration for his activism. There’s Prakash Chik Baraik (42) a popular and rising tribal leader from the Alipurduars who comes from a humble background of tea estate workers. More young blood. Meet Samirul Islam (36) an alumnus of IIT Delhi who spent a short while overseas and then gave it all up to come back to India and work at the grassroots for the welfare of the socially challenged, especially migrant workers.

Then there’s the plucky Jebi Mather of the Congress from Kerala who is an advocate, a former Municipal Councillor and, astonishingly, the first woman Rajya Sabha MP from Kerala in the last 42 years.

These young colleagues of mine have entered Rajya Sabha with a great amount of hope and with the determination to excel in their responsibilities as parliamentarians. Whenever I chat with them, I am glad to see their enthusiasm and their faith in parliamentary procedure.

Let these young people do all it takes to light up an institution that is being turned into a deep, dark chamber.

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How BJP has made a mockery of democracy

The first three days of the new year witnessed a massive strike by truck drivers across northern and western India. Petrol pumps started running out of fuel, there was panic buying, and prices of vegetables and milk skyrocketed. The truckers and their owners were protesting one of the provisions in the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (one of the three new criminal Acts bulldozed recently in Parliament). The Union Home Secretary finally pulled the hand-brake on the provision in the bill that called for stringent penalties in hit-and-run cases.

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An A to Z List For 2023

A random A to Z List for 2023. You too can draw up your personal A to Z List for the year that just slipped by.

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In Parliament, NDA May Well Be ‘No Data Available’

For over 60 years, Question Hour was taken up at 11 am, followed by Zero Hour at 12 noon in Rajya Sabha. Question Hour would often be disrupted due to MPs wanting to raise crucial issues at the start of the day. In 2014, former Chairman Hamid Ansari flipped the timings and now Zero Hour starts at 11 am, followed by Question Hour at 12 noon. A noteworthy reform by a presiding officer. (Reform and presiding officers. Let’s not say a word more!)

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25 per cent of India has been silenced

At noon on December 14, the first MP was suspended. At the time of going to press, another 145 MPs have subsequently been banned from both Houses of Parliament. To provide some perspective, consider this: Across 10 years of UPA I and UPA II, about 50 MPs were suspended from Parliament.

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Let’s bring laughter back to Parliament

In the cutthroat political colosseum, let’s bring back some wit into Parliamentary debates. We have our differences, but let’s not take ourselves too seriously. Nothing like friendly banter to cool off a heated exchange. Here are some other nuggets of humour that have occurred in Parliament over the years. Enjoy.

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Beating air pollution is an investment, not an expenditure

Mitigating air pollution in India must be viewed as an investment, rather than an expenditure. This will ensure future social and economic growth. Stopgap solutions like odd-even usage of car number plates or temporary smog towers will not solve the problem. Long-term national policy interventions are needed both at the macro level and the micro level.

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As A Sports Fan, I Am Angry

Nostalgia, they say, is a good antidote for anger. So let me share with you what I was doing on 25 June 1983. Frame by frame.

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Less Welfare, More PR

The Union government’s welfare schemes are often more hype than substance. Slick marketing succeeds in hiding the flaws. Glib speeches at election rallies present these schemes as “gifts” from the supreme captain rather than what they are: repackaged social welfare schemes, copy-pasted from the states or rebranded programmes that predate Narendra Modi at Lok Kalyan Marg.

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