New Delhi: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said that the country is being pushed back to the medieval era, when the king used to get a person he disliked arrested. He criticized the new bills, which provide for the removal of the Prime Minister, Chief Ministers and Ministers arrested on serious criminal charges and kept in custody for 30 consecutive days.
Three bills providing for the removal of the Prime Minister, Chief Ministers and Ministers arrested on serious criminal charges and kept in custody for 30 consecutive days were introduced in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday, which the House decided to send to the Joint Committee of Parliament for consideration. Gandhi said at a program organized in honor of the Vice Presidential candidate from the opposition, B Sudarshan Reddy, that a lot of work is being done on the new bill that the BJP is proposing. We are going back to the medieval times when the king could remove anyone at will.
'Maharashtra-style vote theft in Bihar'
He further said that there is no concept of what an elected person is. They don't like your face, so they ask the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to file a case and then a democratically elected person is removed within 30 days. This is new. Gandhi, the leader of the opposition in the Lok Sabha, also accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of attempting Maharashtra-style 'vote theft' in Bihar and said such attempts would fail in the upcoming elections.
No scope for meaningful debate or review
At an event held in the Central Hall of Samvidhaan Sadan (old Parliament), Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge said that the Constitution Amendment Bill, which weakens the core values of parliamentary democracy and federalism, is being introduced deceitfully at the end of the session, leaving no scope for meaningful debate or review. He further said that in the last 11 years, we have seen the gross misuse of parliamentary majority to equip autonomous agencies like ED, Income Tax and Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) with harsh powers to target opposition leaders.
We are not given a chance to raise issues - Kharge
Kharge said that now these new bills are going to become a tool in the hands of the ruling party to further weaken and destabilize democratically elected governments in the states. We have seen an increasing trend of suppressing the voice of the opposition in Parliament. We are not given a chance again and again to raise important issues related to the people in the House. The Congress chief also alleged that Parliament has become a means to advance the ideology of the ruling party, where many important bills are being passed amid noise and without proper discussion.
