Right thinking MLAs, be it from the ruling or opposition group, must be feeling that the sittings of the Goa Legislative Assembly must increase. The number of days allotted for the Assembly sessions in a year is too less and hence needs to be increased. Normally the MLAs belonging to the opposition demand more number of days for the Assembly sessions. The ruling class, mostly the Ministers, oppose it because they are the ones who are under public scrutiny during the functioning of the assembly. Telecasting live the proceedings of the Assembly also have created a sense of insecurity among the Ministers as their performance is being evaluated live on the TV. All these factors, in the past, have helped in preventing the government from increasing the number of days for the sittings of the Assembly.
Nevertheless it was surprising to see that the former Chief Minister of Goa, Manohar Parrikar announcing in 2013 that Goa Legislative Assembly would sit at least for 50 days in a year.
This decision of Parrikar government was appreciated because functioning of the Assembly for at least 50 days in a year would give a lot of opportunity for the MLAs, particularly the MLAs from the opposition parties to highlight the issues from their constituencies. Unfortunately, the present day Chief Minister, Laxmikant Parsekar, it appears, has reduced the number of sitting days in the forthcoming monsoon session of Goa Assembly.
Our country is a great democracy but the democratic functioning in the country is not so great. This is evident from the fact that, not only in Goa, but in almost all the states as well as in the Parliament, the functioning of democracy is affected adversely in many ways. This trend of deterioration has been not only in terms of the number of sittings but also in terms of quality of debates. Some of the examples which bring down the status of the Parliament or the Legislative Assembly are: Indiscipline among the elected members, low quality of debates, not so suitable personal and political background of the elected members, regular walk outs, frequent disturbance on the floor of the House, etc., etc. To add to this the number of sittings of the Parliament as well as that of the state Assemblies has decreased year after year, thereby preventing the elected representatives from fulfilling their duties towards their constituencies as well as towards their state and the country.
All elected representatives, be they from the ruling party or the opposition, wish the development of their constituencies to take place as rapidly as possible. The pace with which the development can take place depends on the Minister concerned. Even if the Minister is very co-operative, it can be held up at various levels of administration due to various reasons.
When the Parliament or Assembly session is announced and the MPs and MLAs respectively begin asking questions, placing calling attention motions, moving amendments to existing Acts, introducing new bills, etc., etc. not only the Legislature Department but the whole government machinery starts working in a time-bound frame. Assembly session means public scrutiny of the functioning of the government. The government cannot say that it has done nothing during the last 6 months. It will reflect very badly on the government. The credibility of the government is at stake. Hence, the government will act at least to some extent in order to save its prestige.
Besides, every elected representative gets an opportunity to highlight the plight of his constituency and his people. In doing so, the MPs and MLAs are projected to be alive to the problems faced by the people of their constituencies. The MPs as well as MLAs must get enough time to achieve this goal. Hence there is a need of having longer Parliament as well as State Assembly sessions.
Soon after Independence, our country too, commenced her journey in democracy in right earnest. We followed the conventions prevailing in the British Parliament in the true spirit. During the first Lok Sabha (1952 – 1957) there were 677 sittings. This is the highest recorded count of the number of sittings of our Lok Sabha. The average number of sittings of the Lok Sabha during 1952-57 was 135 days a year. It was almost similar to the British Parliament.
This good trend continued for some time but as time passed and as our political leadership stated getting ‘mature’ in the political field, the number of sittings of the parliament went on declining. The Goa Legislative Assembly has also followed more or less the same trend. In the past, the Goa Legislative Assembly used to meet on an average of 30 to 32 days in a year. In the recent past it met on an average of 28 to 30 days in a year. These numbers of days have been decreased even to 20.
Considering the rapid development of Goa vis-a-vis the issues faced by Goa and Goans, considering the expectations of the people from their elected representatives and considering the importance of the Legislative Assembly in the development of Goa, I feel, the Chief Minister should not reduce the number of working days in the forthcoming Assembly session.
(Tomazinho Cardozo is a former Speaker of Goa Legislative Assembly)
