Why is this government starting to look like UPA 3?

After a stormy season, everybody’s gone home and the monsoon session of Parliament has ended. There are many wise words to take away from this session – “Lalitgate”, “humanitarian grounds”, “family history”, “murder of democracy”. And many stirring moments – a motherly Sumitra Mahajan, Lok Sabha speaker, suspending 25 Congress members of Parliament for the “greater good”, a gleeful Congress camping outside Parliament chanting slogans, a sapient Mulayam Singh Yadav turning unlikely peacemaker. The Lok Sabha this session had everything but the legislation. Almost.

According to PRS Legislative Research, Lok Sabha functioned for 45.7 hours in the 18 day session, out of which 20.8 hours were spent on non-legislative business and 7.6 hours on legislation. Rajya Sabha functioned for 8.5 hours, of which 0.1, or six minutes, were spent on legislative business.

Unfinished business

Parliament closed its doors leaving behind some serious unfinished business, a glance at the planned agenda and the legislature’s actual performance reveals.

There were 12 bills pending for consideration and passing, for both or one of the House. The star bills were the contentious Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Second Amendment) Bill, 2015, and the Constitution (122nd Amendment) (GST) Bill, 2014, which gives both Centre and states concurrent powers to make laws on goods and services tax, and tries to bring all indirect taxes under one tax.

Other celebrity legislation included the Whistle Blowers Protection (Amendment) Bill, 2015, the Prevention of Corruption (Amendment) Bill, 2013, and the controversial Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Bill, 2014, which lowers the age of juvenile offenders from 18 to 16, for certain heinous offences. There were bills that needed urgent attention, like the Mental Health Care Bill, 2013, which ensures vital protections for people with mental disabilities and seeks to upgrade this country’s appalling mental health care system, and the  Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2012, which has attracted criticism from both sides.

Only four bills were passed by the Lok Sabha, two replacing earlier ordinances. The Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Amendment Bill, 2014, saw the highest participation, with a grand total of 14 MPs discussing the bill for two and a half hours. The Repealing and Amending (Fourth) Bill, 2015, was passed by five MPs after less than an hour’s discussion. The Rajya Sabha declined to pass bills.

On land, the government showed signs of backing down on the more unpopular amendments, leaving the states to work out the fine print. But no final agreement could be reached by the joint parliamentary committee on the land bill. The monsoon session ended with the Opposition haranguing government on the GST bill in the Rajya Sabha and with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj alternately defending herself and ticking off the Congress in the Lok Sabha.

Déjà vu

Why is this government starting to look like United Progressive Alliance 3? The last monsoon session of UPA 2, which took place in 2013, had to be extended for five days in the Lok Sabha and six days in the Rajya Sabha. The session had been rocked by the Telangana statehood agitation and the Opposition, with Swaraj then in its ranks, was up in arms about the scam du jour, coal allocations. Files incriminating individuals close to the government had gone missing, forcing then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to make a formal statement that “the government [had] nothing to hide”.

Under the cover of the din, the UPA passed several keys bills with little discussion or debate. These included the Land Acquisition Rehabilitation and Resettlement Bill, 2011, the National Food Security (Second)  Bill, 2013, which replaced an ordinance, and the Companies Bill, 2012. Much of the fevered legislation of the UPA’s last years happened in this manner, unless it took the ordinance route. Washed out sessions, a government unable to speak above the clamour of scam allegations and take charge of the conversation, had given rise to a perception of “policy paralysis”, to accusations of weakness and to key debates being moved outside Parliament.

The National Democratic Alliance was to satisfy people’s craving for a “strong government”. It had the numbers, and it brought a prime minister known for his vigorous communication skills, reaching out to people through his “Mann ki baat” sessions and various public addresses. But the soaring oratory has not translated well in Parliament, where a government needs to persuade and negotiate with the Opposition, to make sure that political rivalries don’t turn into implacable hostilities, to direct the conversation towards issues rather than personalities. After an attacking speech in the House, Prime Minister Narendra Modi ordered his MPs to hit the streets in a “Save Democracy” march.