Govt plans to extend Parliament Budget session due to polls

New Delhi, Mar 3: The Government plans to reorganise the date of the Budget session of Parliament in view of the election schedule declared by the Election Commission for five Assemblies.

Parliamentary Affairs Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi today held a meeting with chief whips of various parties and proposed the first phase of the session which was due to be over on March 17 be extended till March 22 and the second session which was scheduled from April 3 to 28 be shortened and be held between May 9 and 19.

No final decision, however, could be arrived at in the absence of a consensus at the meeting, sources said.

Mr Dasmunsi is understood to have told the leaders that he would also discuss the matter with Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee and Rajya Sabha Chairman Bhairon Singh Shekhawat before any final decision was taken in this regard.

Talking to newspersons, BJP deputy leader in the Rajya Sabha Sushma Swaraj said the Government also wanted that the business related to finance, like the Finance Bill, be completed in the proposed extended first phase of the session.

She said the BJP was of the view that if the vote-on-account was taken on the Finance Bill in the first phase, then the Standing Committee before which these bills were referred to for perusal, would become redundant.

UNI