It would have been a completely different story today if he would have opened the dialogue channel with the Congress party top brass from the very beginning the way he is doing it now to break the deadlock on passing the goods and services tax (GST) Bill.
Thanks to his timely move though to engage non-NDA parties ahead of the start of the Winter Session in preparing the plan for a smooth functioning of Parliament, there is a considerable scaling down in the bitterness between the Opposition and the ruling NDA in the current session.
This, however, hardly means that the government can take it easy now on moving ahead with its legislative reform agenda.
It is just that the talking and deliberations have opened the possibilities for passing those Bills quickly, on which there is no major difference between the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) and non-NDA parties, especially the Congress.
The BJP has to live with the fact that without Congress support, it can’t pass any Bill in the Rajya Sabha — so, there is no point being adamant.
Clearly, while PM Modi and Sonia Gandhi are in the process of finding a workable plan to pass the GST Bill, it would be a good idea to utilise this time and clear other Bills pending before Parliament.
The Business Advisory Committee of the Rajya Sabha has listed consideration and passing of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Amendment Bill, 2015, the Appropriation Acts (Repeal) Bill, 2015, the Repealing and Amending (Third) Bill, 2015, the Whistle Blowers Protection
(Amendment) Bill, 2015 — as passed by Lok Sabha.
Other legislative business to be taken up in the upper house include further consideration and passing of the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Bill, 2015 (as passed by the Lok Sabha); the Prevention of Corruption (Amendment) Bill, 2013; and consideration and passing of the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2012 and also the Negotiable Instruments (Amendment) Bill, 2015.
With this, the two most important Bills — the GST Bill and also the Real Estate (Regulation and Development)Bill, 2013, on which the Rajya Sabha select committee recommendations have also come — are also listed for passage.
Once the ‘intolerance’ debate is over, it would be good if the newfound rationality in the political domain, even if it is a forced one, leads to some serious legislative work in the remaining days of the Winter Session which is slated to end on December 23.