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Winter session to take up creation of Vananchal, Chhattisgarh

Legislation to carve a new state of Vananchal out of Bihar will be taken up for discussion in the winter session of Parliament despite the state assembly's disapproval of the move.

Bills for creating the states of Uttaranchal and Chhattisgarh and conferring full statehood on Delhi will also be taken up in the session which begins on November 30, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Madan Lal Khurana told the media in New Delhi today.

While the Bihar legislature disapproved of the Vananchal bill, the Madhya Pradesh legislature gave its approval to the creation of Chhattisgarh. The Uttar Pradesh legislature suggested some amendments to the bill on Uttaranchal.

Khurana said the bill on Uttaranchal would be introduced after receiving the report of the committee set up by the prime minister to consider the objections of the Shiromani Akali Dal to the inclusion of Udham Singh Nagar district in the new state. But he clarified that the bill will not be sent back to the Uttar Pradesh assembly if any amendments are made on the basis of the committee's report.

The winter session is likely to have 18 sittings spread over 24 days until December 23, including three sittings for private members' business.

The session is being convened at the end of November in view of the assembly election in three states and Delhi on November 25.

A total of 97 bills are being readied for the winter session. Of these, 44 are either ready or have already been introduced in one of the houses of Parliament. Another 27 are being readied for early introduction. The remaining 26 are still to be sent to the Union Cabinet.

Khurana said 12 of the 44 bills that are ready are those that the Bharatiya Janata Party-led coalition had promised in its national agenda for governance. These include the Lok Pal Bill, the Prasar Bharati (Amendment) Bill, the three bills relating to new states, the Delhi Statehood Bill, and the constitutional amendment to reserve seats for women in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies.

He said supplementary demands for the Centre and the railways will also be taken up in the session.

Khurana said the prime minister plans to hold talks with different parties before the session on the bills for electoral reforms and reservation of seats for women.

Other bills listed for the session include the Central Vigilance Commission (Amendment) Bill to replace the ordinance of August 27, the Trade Unions (Amendment) Bill to reduce multiplicity of trade unions, and the Information Technology Bill to make provisions for security and use of electronic transactions and related matters.

The list of bills includes the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, which has been referred to a joint committee of the two houses of Parliament, and three bills pending before standing committees -- the Urban Land Ceiling and Regulation (Repeal) Bill, the Foreign Exchange Management Bill, and the Prevention of Money-Laundering Bill.

Forty-six bills were pending in the two houses of Parliament -- 11 in the Lok Sabha and 35 in the Rajya Sabha -- at the end of the last session.

UNI

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