Do you
know what brackets this 12 together – Mr Sambhaji Chhatrapati; Mr Swapan Das
Gupta; Mrs Roopa Ganguly; Mr Ranjan Gogoi, Dr Narendra Jadhav, Ms Mary Kom,
Dr Sonal Mansingh, Dr Raghunath Mahaptra, Mr Ram Shakal, Mr
Rakesh Sinha, Mr Suresh Gopi, & Dr
Subramanian Swamy !
Former
Prime Minister and JD(S) chief HD Deve Gowda, as well as the former leader of
the Congress in the Lok Sabha, Mallikarjun Kharge, were among the four candidates
for Rajya Sabha from Karanataka who were on Friday declared elected unopposed. The state's ruling BJP sent to Parliament two
MPs - Ashok Gasti and Eranna Kadadi. According
to reports, the 87-year-old Deve Gowda agreed to rise up to the occasion since
the Congress assured him support as the JD(S)' votes alone would not have been
sufficient to ensure his representation.
The ‘Council of
States’ which is also known as Rajya Sabha, a nomenclature that was announced
by the chair in the House on the 23rd August, 1954 has its own distinctive
features. The origin of the second Chamber can be traced to the
Montague-Chelmsford Report of 1918. The Government of India Act, 1919 provided
for the creation of a ‘Council of State’ as a second chamber of the then legislature
with a restricted franchise which actually came into existence in 1921. The
Governor-General was the ex-officio President of the then Council of State. The
Government of India Act, 1935, hardly made any changes in its composition.
The Constituent Assembly, which first met on 9
December 1946, also acted as the Central Legislature till 1950, when it was
converted as ‘Provisional Parliament’.
During this period, the Central Legislature which was known as Constituent
Assembly (Legislative) and later Provisional Parliament was unicameral till the
first elections were held in 1952.
Extensive debate
took place in the Constituent Assembly regarding the utility or otherwise of a
Second Chamber in Independent India and ultimately, it was decided to have a
bicameral legislature for independent India mainly because a federal system was
considered to be most feasible form of Government for such a vast country with
immense diversities. A single directly elected House, in fact, was considered
inadequate to meet the challenges before free India. A second chamber known as the ‘Council of
States’, therefore, was created with altogether different composition and
method of election from that of the directly elected House of the People. It was conceived as another Chamber, with
smaller membership than the Lok Sabha (House of the People). It was meant to be the federal chamber i.e.,
a House elected by the elected members of Assemblies of the States and two
Union Territories in which States were
not given equal representation. Apart
from the elected members, provision was also made for the nomination of twelve
members to the House by the President.
The minimum age of
thirty years was fixed for membership as against twenty-five years for the
Lower House. The element of dignity and
prestige was added to the Council of State House by making the Vice-President
of India ex-officio Chairman of the Rajya Sabha who presides over its sittings.
Article 84 of the Constitution lays down the qualifications for membership of
Parliament. A person to be qualified for
the membership of the Rajya Sabha should posses the following qualifications:
1. he must be a citizen of India and make
and subscribe before some person authorized in that behalf by the Election
Commission an oath or affirmation according to the form set out for the purpose
in the Third Schedule to the Constitution;
2. he must be not less than 30 years of
age;
3. he must possess such other
qualifications as may be prescribed in that behalf by or under any law made by
Parliament.
The
representatives of the States and of the Union Territories in the Rajya Sabha
are elected by the method of indirect election.
The representatives of each State and two Union territories are elected
by the elected members of the Legislative Assembly of that State and by the
members of the Electoral College for that Union Territory, as the case may be,
in accordance with the system of proportional representation by means of the
single transferable vote. The Electoral College for the National Capital
Territory of Delhi consists of the elected members of the Legislative Assembly
of Delhi, and that for Puducherry consists of the elected members of the
Puducherry Legislative Assembly.
The present salary
of the member is Rs.1,00,000/- pm + daily allowance per day for attending the
session. Constituency Allowance `
70,000/- p.m. is further payable during the whole term of office as member,
Rajya Sabha. There are other heads like 4.
Office Expense Allowance `60,000/- p.m and Travelling allowance. Travelling Allowance is paid for attending a Session of Rajya Sabha or a
Meeting of a Committee or for the purpose of attending to any other business
connected with his/her duties as a Member from his/her usual place of residence
(UPR) to the place of duty and back is admissible. One free
non-transferable Railway pass which entitles the Member alone or with spouse to
travel in first class air-conditioned or Executive class by any train in India
along with a companion in AC two tier. A Member having no spouse may be
accompanied by any person in place of the spouse in the same class in addition
to the facility of one companion in AC two tier. RS perks
At a time when economy has
been in a slump over several quarters, the Rajya Sabha secretariat paid Rs 8
crore to the Indian Railways as expenses incurred by Rajya Sabha members with
free travel. As the bill for 2019 was higher than usual, the Railways blamed it
on serious malpractices by the MPs. It was found that Rajya Sabha members have been
found misusing the perks and privileges they enjoy and in complete disregard of
the ongoing national crisis, much of the public money was wasted. This has
forced the Rajya Sabha secretariat to issue a stern note of caution that in
case of future violations, deductions will be made from their salaries. A former MP had booked 63 train tickets in the month of
January 2019 but travelled only on seven of those tickets. He sought
reimbursement for all the 63 tickets, costing Rs.1,69,005. The cost of the
seven tickets he used is only Rs.22,085. Government had to bear the extra cost of Rs.,46,920. The leader (name withheld) was a CPI(M) Rajya Sabha
member from West Bengal. . RS MP train
The Rajya Sabha
secretariat has found several instances of MPs and former lawmakers booking
multiple tickets and not availing of them yet seeking reimbursement. Vice
President M Venkaiah Naidu had directed the Rajya Sabha secretariat to look
into the issue after it was brought to his notice. In another case, that of a
sitting member of Rajya Sabha, the officials found that the person had
undertaken a journey only on 15% of the tickets bought in January 2019 but
sought reimbursement for all tickets.
Shri N. Gopalaswami
Ayyangar was the first Leader of the RS from May 1952. The recent leaders have been Mr Jaswant Singh
(1999-2004); Dr Manmohan Singh (2009 – 2014) and Mr Arun Jaitley (2014 - … )
~ those
12 names mentioned are the nominated members of the Rajya Sabha. Last year the tenure of veteran actress Rekha
and famous Cricketer Sachin Tendulkar’s RS tenure came to an end. The two had been nominated in 2012 but faced
severe criticism over their low attendance record.
During her six-year
tenure, Rekha did not introduce any bill, nor did she ask any question in the
House. She has been a part of the Food, Consumer Affairs and Public
Distribution committee, as per the Rajya Sabha website. When Sachin and Rekha
were nominated to the House of Elders in 2012, there were several questions
raised over the selection procedures.
India is a
democracy
With regards – S.
Sampathkumar
13.6.2020.
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