People's Democracy

Somnath Refutes Claim of Unanimity  

The CPI(M) floor leader in Lok Sabha, Somnath Chatterjee, has issued the following statement on July 15, 2003 in the light of statements by BJP spokesman that there was near unanimity at the meeting called by the Speaker to discuss the Women’s Reservation Bill:

AT today’s meeting convened by the Hon’ble Speaker, Lok Sabha on the Women’s Reservation Bill, on behalf of the CPI(M), I reiterated that the bill as proposed should be passed in the current session and that the government should bring the bill before the house for consideration and passing. Several proposals were made by the leaders of different parties, which included a proposal for increasing the number of seats in the house and to provide some Double Member Constituencies to enable women to be elected.  There was also a suggestion for reducing the percentage of reservation for women to 20 per cent and then to leave the matter to the Election Commission to formalise.

I never agreed on behalf of the CPI(M) to any such alternate proposal and it was only suggested that if the government formulated some proposals and put them in the form of amendments then the same would be considered but there was no question of accepting any such proposal at the present stage.

It has been reported to me that the spokesman of the BJP has referred to an alleged agreement on the creation of double member constituencies and of increasing the number of seats in the house. I wish to categorically state that there was no occasion for me to accept the proposal except to state that as and when they were presented in proper form, the same would be considered on merits. As I indicated in the meeting, our Party’s stand is very clear that the bill as proposed should be passed.  I did categorically mention in the meeting that the bill was pending for a long time and the credibility of the parliament as an institution has been seriously called in question because of the unreasoned delay and procrastination on the part of the ruling party and there should not be any further delay.