Karnataka: With rising Covid-19 cases, monsoon session truncated to 5 days

BENGALURU: As the number of Covid-19 positive cases shows no signs of abating, chief minister BS Yediyurappa and the BJP government prevailed over the opposition parties - Congress and JD(S) - to close the 10 day assembly session within the next five days.
Further, the ruling party and opposition have agreed to have a detailed discussion and debate on only 6 of the whopping 35 bills that will be tabled in the same duration.
On Monday, soon after the motion of condolence was passed by the assembly, Speaker Vishveshwara Hegde Kageri called for the business advisory committee (BAC) meeting with the senior leadership of all the three political parties to decide on truncating the number of days.
At the meeting, opposition leader Siddaramaiah claimed the BJP government had expressed its desire to truncate the assembly session in light of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“The government made a case citing that even the Parliament and other state assemblies had also taken similar decisions to truncate the legislature. While we wanted it to be extended beyond the proposed 8 days of sitting, the government wanted it reduced. Finally, we have agreed upon having the assembly session till Saturday-- September 26,” said Siddaramaiah.
The opposition leader said the BAC has decided to extend the daily hours of session by starting early-- 10 am-- and end it by 6 or 7 pm.
On the discussion and debates over bills, Siddaramaiah said law minister JC Madhuswamy and Congress representative Krishna Byregowda will sit with Speaker Kageri on which bills will be discussed and which will be allowed to pass without a debate due to paucity of time.
Later, according to Byregowda, the government and opposition have agreed upon discussing only six of the 35 bills which are controversial in nature.
“We had a fruitful meeting with the law minister and the Speaker in this regard. Effectively, there are three major and controversial bills which need to be debated at length. Another three to four bills need an explanation from the government. The rest have been agreed upon as being routine and can be agreed upon to pass without much cause for concern,” he said.
The one sticking point has been with regard to having the question hour.
“While the government wants to table its answers to questions posed by legislators, we have said there needs to be a discussion on them .This has not been resolved,” said Siddaramaiah.