The Hindu : National : Pension Bill: Left stages walkout in Lok Sabha

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Tuesday, Mar 22, 2005

National

National

Pension Bill: Left stages walkout in Lok Sabha

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, MARCH 21. For the first time since the 14th Lok Sabha was constituted, members of the Left parties supporting the Government walked out of the House today in protest against the introduction of the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority Bill, 2005, with Gurudas Dasgupta of the Communist Party of India (CPI) stating that "we will vote against it."

After opposing the ordinance route adopted by the Government to bring in the draft legislation, the Left members staged the walkout when the Finance Minister, P. Chidambaram, sought permission of the House to introduce the Bill. As the "nos" drowned the "ayes," the Left members walked out. Following this the Bill that seeks to replace the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority Ordinance, 2004 was introduced.

Earlier, Varkala Radhakrishnan (CPI-M) was the first to oppose the introduction of the Bill. Stating that the new pension system had been in place since January 1, 2004, he demanded to know the rationale for promulgating an ordinance in December last year.

"What was the urgency?" he asked, stating that Article 123 ought to be invoked only when immediate action was inevitable.

Similar views were expressed by his party colleague, Basudeb Acharia, and the House also saw Mamta Banerjee of the Trinamool Congress joining her arch political rivals — the CPI (M) — in opposing the Bill. Before walking out with an announcement that he would vote against the Bill, Mr. Dasgupta sought to know from the Finance Minister why he had chosen the ordinance route to bring in the legislation.

`Several tools'

Outside the House, the CPI (M) member of the Lok Sabha, Mohammad Salim, said the walkout was the first strategy employed by the party to articulate its opposition to the Bill. Asked whether the CPI (M) would vote against the Bill, he said: "Several tools are available in Parliament to oppose a legislation. We used one today by walking out — our first against the Government we support — and will decide what to do next stage-by-stage."

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