After session wash out, Govt strikes conciliatory note on GST

A day after monsoon session came to an acrimonious end, Government today struck a conciliatory note saying it would talk to all parties to ensure passage of GST Bill and appealed to them to "bury the past" as any delay to enact the law would hurt the national interests.
Voicing concern over disruption of Parliament proceedings Union Minister M Venkaiah Naidu said that as Parliamentary Affairs Minister, he strongly feels that time has come to revisit the Rules of Business of legislatures to enable their effective functioning.
Reaching out to opposition, particularly Congress and the Left, to help take forward the legislation, Naidu, said no decision has been taken as yet to call special session and the government would first discuss it will other parties.

"The need of the hour is to bury the immediate and distant past. The need of the hour is also to end the politics of revenge and tit for tat," Naidu told reporters, addressing a press conference as part of BJP's strategy to "expose" the Congress for blocking key legislations, including the GST.
The Minister said there were some suggestions to reconvene Parliament at the earliest and take forward the GST Bill."It is necessary to bring into force the GST by April next year. Any delay would only hurt our national interests."
He said the government would talk to all parties and "explore how quickly we can do it."

"I sincerely appeal to all concerned not to allow a repeat of the Monsoon session. Let us not let the people down," he said striking a note of conciliation to give a push to one of the Modi government's big bang reforms.

To a question if a special session would be called, he said "we have not taken any decision. We will talk to all parties."
At the same time, Naidu also blamed Congress for wash-out of monsoon session and said it had clearly lost the plot and "got it wrong and as a result, painted itself into a corner."

Pitching for effective functioning of legislatures, Naidu said the revisited rules should enable free and fair expression of the concerns of the people by the elected representatives without disrupting their functioning.
The Minister said by revisiting the Rules of Business of legislatures, "the intention is not to discipline the MPs and MLAs but to allow the aspirations of the people to be properly addressed. There is a need for a wider public debate if persistent violators of the dignity and decorum of legislatures should be properly punished or not."
He said Parliamentary democracy finds itself at crossroads if the will of people is subverted and Government of the day is not allowed to function.