On a number of key policy decisions, the government has been at the receiving end of strident criticism from parliamentary standing committees in recent months. The fact that members from the ruling coalition form the biggest bloc within most of these panels has sparked off speculation that along with the members from opposition parties, members of the ruling party in these committees could well be stonewalling their own government?s decisions in deference to the National Advisory Council?s social-sector-dominated agenda.

For instance, the parliamentary committee on petroleum and natural gas, as part of its report on demand for grants submitted on April 23, has questioned the government?s decision to go in for dual pricing of diesel to bulk consumers and asked for exemption of the railways and state transport corporations. This is despite the fact that the panel, headed by Congress party?s Aruna Kumar Vundavalli, has 17 of its 31 member from within the ruling UPA or parties such as the SP or the BSP offering outside support to the coalition, compared with just eight members from the opposition NDA grouping.

The parliamentary standing committee on coal and steel, in a report tabled in Parliament on April 24, too was unequivocal in terming the government?s policy of awarding captive coal allocations as ?unauthorised, illegal and most non-transparent?. ?The natural resources and state largesse were distributed to few (entities) for their own benefit without following any transparent system… Was total abuse of power by the government,? the committee said in the report tabled in Parliament. Noting that ?the government cannot give largesse on its arbitrary discretion or its sweet will?, it noted the allocations between 1993 and 2010 were ?illegal and amounted to huge losses to the state exchequer?, virtually endorsing a Comptroller and Auditor General report that had pointed to undue benefits flowing to private companies due to allocation of coal blocks without auction. The panel, headed by Trinamool Congress Lok Sabha member Kalyan Banerjee, has 11 of its 31 member from the ruling coalition and its partners and an equal number of members from the principal opposition alliance.

According to MR Madhavan of PRS Legislative Research, standing committees are generally expected to be non-partisan in approach and work as an independent committee. Lok Sabha member Gurudas Dasgupta, one of the members of the standing committee on finance, was even more vocal. ?It is the job of the members (of standing committees) to take a view independent of the government and their parties and present an objective and unbiased report. If the report were to be only a reflection of the government, the committees would become superfluous.?

Keeping with the trend, the committee on finance, as part of its report on demand for grants tabled in the Budget session, reiterated its call for an abolition of the securities transaction tax (STT). The committee, in an earlier report on the Direct Taxes Code Bill, had favoured the abolition of the STT. Finance minister P Chidambaram had announced imposition of an STT on non-agricultural commodities in the 2013-14 budget, at a rate of 0.01% cent or Rs 10 for every transaction worth Rs 1 lakh, to be paid by the seller. The panel, headed by the BJP?s Yashwant Sinha, has 15 of its 31 members from the UPA or parties supporting it from the outside, while there are eight member from the NDA.

On the goods and services tax, due to the ongoing negotiations and frequent design changes in the model of the GST by the Centre, the standing committee on finance has on its own decided to stop examining the crucial Constitutional Amendment Bill for roll-out of the tax.

The parliamentary standing committee on transport, in its report on the demand for grants of the road ministry, questioned the government on using the public-private partnership model for road projects, claiming that under the system private developers only want to carry out profitable projects. The panel headed by CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury, with 13 of the 31 members representing the ruling dispensation, also pulled up the lanning Commission for its ?overbearing role? in finalising contracts for road projects and asked it to restrict itself to its own jurisdiction.

In a report on the civil aviation ministry, the committee questioned the Union Budget 2013-14 and said it does not have much to offer for the aviation sector. ?The industry?s most vociferous demand of reduction of sales tax on aviation turbine fuel (ATF), which varies from 4-25% from state to state, and ?declared goods? status for ATF could not be addressed by the Government in this year?s budget also,? it noted, adding that even the proposal for putting in place a civil aviation regulator has been pending for long. The committee has nine members from the NDA.