Committee refuses to drop important assurances as ‘Long time for fulfilment cannot be the sole reason to drop’
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
January 17, 2022
In this second part on dropping assurances, we review the assurances that were dropped for other reasons such as fulfilment is no more the responsibility of the current ministry. We would also look at assurances whose request to drop has not been accepted by the Committee as it said that a long time for fulfilment cannot be the sole reason to drop.
In the first of this two-part series, we looked at the assurances dropped by the Lok Sabha’s Committee on Governance Assurances because of the two reasons, namely – assurances that cannot be fulfilled in the near future, and assurances are no longer under consideration and would not be fulfilled.
In this second part, we review the assurances that were dropped for other reasons such as fulfilment is no more the responsibility of the current ministry. We would also look at assurances whose request to drop has not been accepted by the Committee.
Assurances relating to ‘Operation of Digital Board’ and ‘Review of NCERT Books’ among those subsumed by other departments or schemes
Among the assurances that were dropped by the Committee, are those that were dropped because the responsibility of the fulfillment does not lie with the ministry anymore, as the assurance is already part of another initiative, or the responsibility lies with other departments/ministries.
Few such dropped assurances include:
Unstarred Question 3438 (Department of School Education & Literacy)
The question was about the implementation of “Operation Digital Board” and was dropped for the following reasons:
Unstarred Questions 6641 & 4129 (Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs)
The questions were regarding the requests received from Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose INA Trust and other organizations for the allotment of land in New Delhi for the Netaji memorial.
The assurances were dropped for the following reasons:
Unstarred Question 2091 (Ministry of Education)
The question was regarding NCERT reviewing ‘National Curriculum Framework (NCF) – 2005’ in school textbooks. The question was dropped for the following reasons:
Unstarred Question 1149 (Ministry of Finance – Department of Expenditure)
The question was regarding ‘Parity between IAS & non-IAS officers in Seventh Pay Recommendations’. It was dropped for the following reasons:
Starred Question 342 (Ministry of Jal Shakti)
The question was regarding Shortage of Water in Telangana, due to new projects built by Andhra Pradesh and the action to be taken on these projects. The assurance was dropped for the following reasons:
The Committee observed that a long time for fulfillment cannot be considered as criteria for important assurances to be dropped.
Out of the 27 requests for dropping the assurances received by Lok Sabha’s Committee on Government Assurances (2021-22), 6 requests for dropping have not been accepted by the Committee.
Here is a look at the comments provided by the Committee for not dropping these assurances as per the 53rd Report.
Unstarred Question 29 (Ministry of Culture)
The assurance was related to the setting up/ construction of the ‘National Centre for Performing Arts (NCPA) and the Indian Institute of Culture’. The committee gave the following response for not dropping the assurance:
Unstarred Question 3519 (Ministry of Corporate Affairs)
The question was related to developing ‘India’s Nation Action Plan (NAP) on Business and Human Rights’. The Committee’s reasons for not accepting the drop request are the following.
Unstarred Question 3413 (Ministry of Finance – Department of Revenue)
The question was regarding the creation of ‘New Tariff lines for Cashew’. The Ministry has examined and decided that the creation of new tariff lines cannot be considered. The Committee observed that, since the Ministry decided on this matter, the assurance would be deemed as fulfilled and has requested the implementation report to be laid in the House. Hence the request for dropping the assurance is not accepted.
Starred Question 277 (Ministry of Defence)
The Question was related to the delay in HAL’s handing over the Intermediate Jet Trainer (IJT) to the Indian Air force. The Ministry contended that the assurance cannot be fulfilled owing to the uncertainty involved in IJT Programme. The Committee observed that:
Unstarred Question 680 (Ministry of Defence)
The question is relating to the construction of Polyclinics under ECHS. The Ministry has cited that acquiring land takes a long time and it has to negotiate and deal with various local authorities.
The Committee in its reasons for not dropping the Assurance has stated that:
Unstarred Question 4684 (Ministry of Finance – Department of Revenue)
The question was regarding providing certain privileges for honest taxpayers. The Ministry’s request to drop this assurance was based on assurance for a similar question being dropped in Rajya Sabha. The Committee felt that this cannot be cited as a reason for dropping the assurance, and further asked the ministry to expedite taking a decision on granting privileges to honest taxpayers, as they contribute towards nation-building.