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Early passage of Right to Information Bill likely

Sunny Sebastian

Parliament boycott hits Employment Guarantee Bill

JAIPUR: The chances of an early passage of the Right to Information Bill have brightened with Parliament's Standing Committee on Personal, Public Grievances, Law and Justice submitting its recommendations. However, the Employment Guarantee Bill, the other social security legislation pursued by the activist groups, may get delayed further with the Standing Committee of Parliament on Rural Development, not yet submitting its report.

The meeting of the Standing Committee on Rural Development, scheduled to be held on Thursday, has been postponed reportedly because of the Opposition decision to continue the boycott of Parliament proceedings. The Standing Committee is headed by the Bharatiya Janata Party leader, Kalyan Singh.

Sonia's assurance

The optimism on the Right to Information front is also from the assurance from Sonia Gandhi, the chairperson of the National Advisory Committee on Common Minimum Programme of the United Progressive Alliance, on the early passage of the two Bills.

In response to letters written recently to her by Aruna Roy and Jean Dreze, members of the NAC, Ms.Gandhi said that she was "hopeful'' of the passage of the Right to Information Bill with the requisite amendments in the current session of Parliament. However, Ms. Gandhi expressed concern over the slow progress on the proposed Employment Guarantee Bill.

On her part, Ms.Gandhi told Ms.Roy and Prof.Dreze, that she had already written to the Group of Ministers (GoM) on the amendments needed in the Employment Guarantee Bill on the basis of the consensus at NAC about its "inadequate nature''. The GoM would be in a position to act only when the Standing Committee submits its report, she pointed out.

Suggestions not included

The NAC members, in their letters had pointed out to Ms.Gandhi that many of the recommendations made by the Standing Committee were not incorporated in the review draft of Right to Information Bill circulated at present. "The most critical of the recommendation left out -- perhaps by oversight -- was of the mechanism for imposing penalties (Section 17),'' they pointed out.

"Changes are further needed to be brought out in the revised Right to Information Bill if it is to be made consonant with the letter and intent of the report of the Standing Committee,'' Ms.Roy and Prof.Dreze told Ms.Gandhi in their letter.

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