No breakthrough on insurance Bill

Govt unwilling to give in to Cong 'blackmail'

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday consulted with his senior ministers on the strategy to ensure passage of the Insurance Amendment Bill during the current session of Parliament. The possibility, however, of the Bill being passed in the ongoing session looked increasingly bleak, with a scheduled all-party meeting to discuss the issue having been cancelled.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s efforts to reach out to some of the opposition parties seemed to have yielded little results, with sources saying the Bill was unlikely to be tabled in the Rajya Sabha on Thursday. With Friday reserved for private members’ bills in the Rajya Sabha and the session scheduled to end on August 14, the government now has less than a week left to get the Bill through.

Experts, like former Lok Sabha secretary general Subhash C Kashyap, are of the view the government needed to employ a combination of procedural and political management to get out of a difficult situation. “It is evident that the opposition is building pressure on the government for a quid pro quo. The reasons are more political than ideological. The Congress wants the Leader of Opposition status in Lok Sabha,” Kashyap said.

He said there was little the government could do if it tabled the Bill in the Rajya Sabha and the majority of the House demanded it be referred to a select committee. The Congress has maintained the Bill in its current form had many amendments and should be referred to a committee. The Trinamool Congress and Left Parties support the Congress. The government, however, has insisted the changes were inconsequential like change of dates and numerals, and that it was willing to accommodate any minor modifications that the opposition parties want.

The ruling National Democratic Alliance is in a minority in the Upper House. Sources said some of the procedural tactics could be for the government to convince the Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party and some other opponents like All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam to either abstain themselves or oppose the proposition that the Bill be referred to a select committee. The government has found support from the Biju Janata Dal and Nationalist Congress Party on the Bill but this would prove insufficient as things stand. The government would rather like the Bill to be defeated in the Upper House, so that it could get it passed in the Lok Sabha where it has ample majority, and then call for a joint session of Parliament. "But the Congress' only interest is to somehow delay the passage of this Bill," a government source said.

Sources in the BJP said Modi discussed the issue with finance minister Arun Jaitley, home minister Rajnath Singh and external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj. BJP sources said the party was unlikely to succumb to Congress’ bargaining tactics on the leader of opposition issue. It also said the Congress, which had shepherded the Bill during the United Progressive Alliance years, only wanted to embarrass Modi by not allowing him to get the credit of carrying out key economic reforms as he prepares to leave for key foreign visits to Japan and the United States in September.