In Rajya Sabha, parties get equitable share of opportunities

Different parties in Rajya Sabha got equitable share of opportunities for participation in the first half of the Budget Session, officials have said. In a first of its kind analysis undertaken by the Rajya Sabha Secretariat, it has emerged that the BJP with 34 per cent of the strength of the House got 33 per cent of total opportunities, while Congress with 19 per cent strength got 24 per cent opportunities to raise matters in the House.

The analysis was done after Chairman Venkaiah Naidu desired to know if the parties were getting equitable opportunities in the Council of States. The results reveal that there was a fair and proportional share for different parties, with the opposition getting slightly more opportunities of the total 1,460 provided in the House, the sources said.

The BJP with 82 members accounted for 34 per cent of the 239-member House as it got 480 opportunities amounting to 33 per cent of the total, the survey reveals. The Congress with 46 members, constituting 19 per cent of the strength of the House, got 345 opportunities which came to 24 per cent share of the total, the sources said.

The 10 recognised parties in the House, with five members and above, each with a total of 190 members accounting for 80 per cent of the strength of the Council got about 81 per cent of the total opportunities, the survey pointed out. Others including regional parties and independents amounting to 20 per cent of the membership of the House got 19 per cent share of participation, indicating a broad correspondence between the strength and share of opportunities, it said.

The 8 non-NDA parties, featuring among the 10 recognised parties, together got a higher share of opportunities in proportion to their strength, the sources point out. Among the opposition and non-NDA parties, Congress, TMC, AIADMK got proportionally higher opportunities, while BJD, DMK, TRS and CPM got their due share. Only SP got a lesser share.

During the session, 107 members participated in the Question Hour, 100 took part in the two debates on the Motion of Thanks to the President and the General Budget, 76 took part in Zero Hour and 33 Special Mentions were made, 24 participated in the lone discussion on private member's bill besides 1,120 Unstarred Questions of 118 members were replied in writing. This makes the zone of opportunities of participation as 1,460. Equity of participation was analysed against this window of total opportunities of participation as per the survey.

The analysis, however, revealed that members from the regional parties outshined others in respect of overall individual performances. Eighteen members from regional parties (60 per cent) were among the top 30 performers, while eight from the BJP, four of the Congress accounted for the remaining 40 per cent. Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu has directed the secretariat to prepare reports on the participation of all the members under various windows to inform them at the end of each session, the sources said.

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