NEW DELHI: The Bill to ban triple talaq was stuck in the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday, though it remains on the board to come up again on Thursday.
The House was adjourned for the day after 50 minutes of noisy wrangle over Anand Sharma of Congress bringing a motion on behalf of the united Opposition to refer the Bill as passed by the Lok Sabha to a select committee for thorough scrutiny.
Leader of House Arun Jaitley put up a spirited defence for passing the Bill in the current session itself that ends on Friday, terming Sharma’s motion as “invalid” since it was brought just at 3 PM and not with an advance notice of 24 hours.
The Opposition members indulged in ruckus as Jaitley and Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad spoke while the ministers and BJP MPs created noisy scenes protesting at Sharma claiming that his motion was as per the directive of Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu in the business advisory committee (BAC) meeting on Tuesday to bring it when the Bill comes up for discussion.
Opposition leader Ghulam Nabi Azad pressed for a “division” on the ground that “in democracy, majority prevails.” Deputy Chairman Prof. P J Kurien, however, said he can’t take the division when the House is in disorder, citing the pandemonium created by the ruling benches, and adjourned for the day.
The House adjourned, Law Minister Prasad and Railway Minister Piyush Goyal decried the Congress for playing politics and hypocrisy in denying the right sought to be given to the Muslim women and playing double role — backing the Bill in the Lok Sabha where it is in minority and changing stance in the Rajya Sabha where the government is in minority.
In a retort in the House to Jaitley, Anand Sharma challenged the government to get the women’s reservation bill passed if it wants to be champion of women’s right and pointed out that the Congress is also for ban on the triple talaq but provisions of the Bill hurriedly formulated need thorough scrutiny.
Congress member Kapil Sibal, who was counsel of the Muslim Personal Law Board in the Supreme Court, said the Apex Court judgment declaring triple talaq as void, unconstitutional and illegal is already the law, but it did not prescribe three years of jail to the guilty husband as put in the Bill by the Government.
As a precaution, the Congress had also moved two amendments in the Bill in case the Chair refuses to send it to the House committee as it would get the amendments passed on the strength of the Opposition having majority in the House.
Just a coincidence that the similar tactic adopted by the Rajya Sabha Opposition on July 31 to get amended a Constitution amendment bill for constitutional status to the National Commission for Backward Classes (OBCs) was sought to be foiled by the government in a Bill brought in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday to provide an “alternative” to the amendments forced in the Rajya Sabha.
The Bill, however, could not be passed as the pandemonium broke out in the Lok Sabha during debate on the Bill when the ruling benches strongly protested at Trinamul Congress member Kalyan Banerjee pricked them as to “why are the Gujarat OBCs fighting against you.”
The Rajya Sabha amendments were to provide representation to women and minorities in the Commission and have eight or more members instead of five.
