AN EFFECTIVE VOICE OF MLAs

Parliamentary committees are replica of the House. In a democratic system, the proceedings of parliamentary committees are as important as the proceedings of the House. The proceedings of parliamentary committees are extremely important for the transparency, accountability and good governance of democracy. As per traditions, the actual test of participation of public representatives, accountability of administration and quality of democracy is done by the committees of the Legislative Assemblies of different states of the country. Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla has constituted a committee of seven Legislative Assembly Speakers to review the strength of the committees of the Legislative Assemblies of the country. Rajasthan Legislative Assembly Speaker Vasudev Devnani is a member of this committee. This committee is preparing a report for the strengthening of the Legislative Assembly Committees by doing a comparative study of the committees formed in the Legislative Assemblies of different states of the country. This committee includes the Speakers of Rajasthan Legislative Assembly as well as Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh and Odisha Legislative Assemblies. The report prepared by the committee will be presented to the Lok Sabha Speaker.

Important suggestions for strengthening the committees

The first meeting of the committee was held in the Madhya Pradesh Legislative Assembly. In this meeting, Rajasthan Legislative Assembly Speaker Vasudev Devnani gave important suggestions. To increase the attendance of members in the meetings of the committees, members should join virtually and the selection of members in the committees should be done on the basis of party as well as merit and distinction. Four-five years old cases are examined in the committees. The committees should examine the cases of the nearest years so that there is an opportunity to include the suggestions of the committees in the budget of the same year for implementation. A suggestion also came to consider the virtual/online joining of members to increase the attendance of members in the meetings of the committees. It was discussed in the meeting that by connecting the members online in the meetings of the committees, the consequences of their work being confidential will have to be seriously considered. Devnani believed that the presence of members will definitely increase due to online meetings but more care will have to be taken regarding the confidentiality of the work of the committee.

There should be discussion on reports of the committees in the House

A proposal came in the meeting that there should be a discussion on the reports of the committees in the House. This will increase the interest of the MLAs in the work of the committees. Discussion on the reports of the committees in the House will also determine accountability. Discussion on the reports of the committees in the House will increase the participation of the MLAs in the work of the committees.

Concern over not getting answers to questions on time

Many times the answers to the questions asked by the MLA do not come for months and sometimes the entire session ends, still the answers are not received. All the Assembly Speakers expressed concern over this in the meeting. It emerged unanimously in the meeting that if the administration is not accountable, then the role of the committees will become ineffective.

To solve the problem of not getting answers to the questions on time in the Rajasthan Legislative Assembly, the Speaker Vasudev Devnani held a meeting with the Chief Secretary and all the Principal Secretaries in the Rajasthan Legislative Assembly, as a result of which the answers to the questions of the last session were received on time.

Rajasthan Legislative Assembly is leading in the direction of strengthening, innovation and reform of the committee system

At present, 17 committees are functioning in Rajasthan Legislative Assembly. Some committees whose work was relatively limited have been reorganized by creatively merging them with other more active committees, such as Library Committee into Government Assurances Committee and Ethics Committee into Petitions Committee, so that integrated and effective functioning of the committees can be ensured.

Committees are replica of the House

Committees are replica of the House. Meetings of committees save the time of the House, which can be spent in discussing important matters. The appointment of committees, their tenure, functions and the procedure for conducting the work of the committee are regulated under the provisions of the rules and as per the directions issued by the Speaker under those rules. There are three types of rules regarding parliamentary committees - general rules, which apply to all committees, specific rules, which provide for special committees and internal working rules, which are made by the concerned committees themselves with the approval of the Speaker and they relate to the detailed procedure of doing work.

Two types of committees

Permanent and adhoc committees are formed in Rajasthan Vidhan Sabha. Permanent committees are divided according to their work.

Committees that control the financial and administrative powers of the government, committees that investigate, committees that scrutinize, committees related to day-to-day work of the assembly and committee related to providing facilities to the members have been formed. Members of the committee can only be members of the Vidhan Sabha, ministers are not members of any permanent committee. Ministers are only the chairpersons of the select committee formed on the bill.

Innovation in Rajasthan Legislative Assembly

Formation of General Purposes Committee- A ‘General Purposes Committee’ has been formed for timely review of the activities of all committees. Such a committee has been formed for the first time in Rajasthan Legislative Assembly. This committee is chaired by the Speaker himself and includes the chairpersons of all the committees. A meeting is held every three months, in which the number of meetings of the committees, progress of tests, attendance of members etc. are thoroughly reviewed.

Next meeting in Rajasthan

Rajasthan Legislative Assembly Speaker Vasudev Devnani proposed to hold the next meeting of the committee of presiding officers constituted to review the committee system in Rajasthan. This proposal of Devnani was accepted after discussion in the meeting.