Rajya Sabha adjourned sine die, Chairman expresses satisfaction (Lead)
New Delhi : The Rajya Sabha was on Friday adjourned sine die as the Monsoon session came to a close as scheduled.
Making the announcement, Chairman Chairman M. Venkaiah Naidu expressed satisfaction at the overall functioning and efficiency of the upper House during the session.
The Chairman said that with productivity of more than 74 per cent, the Monsoon session proved to be "about three times more productive than the last Budget session" and the House passed 14 Bills.
"Against the time lost of 27 hours and 42 minutes during the session on account of disruptions, the House sat beyond the scheduled time on four days, gaining around three hours," Naidu observed in his valedictory remarks.
The Rajya Sabha, in an unusual gesture, sat beyond its scheduled time on Friday and passed two government legislations, besides discussing three private members' resolutions.
"Of the total of 17 sittings held, there were no disruptions of any kind on five days. We had Question Hour on 12 days, a total of 91 oral questions were taken up, Members made a record 120 Zero Hour submissions, 61 Special Mentions were made and a total duration of about 27 hours was spent on discussing Bills accounting for about 30 per cent of the total time. This comes to more than two hours discussing each Bill," he added.
A total of 146 reports by various committees were presented to the House.
One Calling Attention Notice on the issue of misuse of social media and the need for checking the same was taken up; one Short Duration Discussion on the implementation of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act and another special discussion on the issue of National Register for Citizens (NRC) in Assam were also taken up, he said.
"In all, a total of 496 members spoke on various issues under different windows like Zero Hour, Question Hour, Calling Attention Notices, Short Duration Discussion, discussion on Bills including Private Members Bills, Special Mentions, etc.," Naidu said.
Speaking of several "firsts" in this session, the Chairman told the House that e-Notice system has been introduced. A total of 102 e-Notices were received during the session from 22 members.
Ram Vichar Netam got the distinction of being the first member to submit Zero Hour/ Question notice online.
"First-time member Kahkashan Perween has 'presided over' the Question Hour becoming the first to do so. Within seven minutes into Question Hour, she asked a Minister to be to the point so as to give chance to members to speak which even the experienced hesitate to do," Naidu said.
"The monsoon has been good and so is the Monsoon session. Let us look forward to the Winter session with these happy memories ringing in our minds till then," he added.
However, he underlined in the same breath that while some members may think that disruptions are a part of parliamentary functioning and strategy, on his part he could not take "whatever happens inside the House as a matter of déjà vu".
"Which means that it is not new and has happening earlier, too. I know that Parliament to some extent is a political institution resulting in heightened tempers and altercations at time. But that can't be a pattern," Naidu said.
