Adhir Ranjan Chaudhary named Congress leader in Lok Sabha
New Delhi: Senior Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chaudhary was on Tuesday named as leader of Congress in Lok Sabha by UPA chairperson and Congress Parliamentary Party chief Sonia Gandhi, party sources said.
According to top Congress sources, the letter nominating Chaudhary, an MP from West Bengal's Behrampur, as party leader in the lower house was sent to Lok Sabha Secretariat.
The party source said, however, the name of the chief whip has not been finalised yet.
Sonia Gandhi was elected as the Chairperson of the CPP on June 1. At the meeting, party leaders had empowered her to name the party leader and the chief whip in the Lok Sabha.
The Congress is again set to lose the position of Leader of Opposition post in the lower house as it falls two seats short.
The Congress won 52 out of 542 seats. As per rules, the Congress needs one-tenth of the total seats (54) to lay claim for the Leader of the Opposition's post.
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Meghwal, Shah move to introduce bills in LS to tweak women's quota law, set up delimitation panel
New Delhi (PTI): Union ministers Arjun Ram Meghwal and Amit Shah on Thursday moved to introduce three bills in the Lok Sabha to amend the women's quota law and set up a delimitation commission amid protests by the opposition, which termed the proposed legislations anti-constitutional.
Congress' K C Venugopal questioned why proposed changes in the women's quota law were not incorporated when it was earlier passed by Parliament.
"Bills to tweak the women's quota law and set up a delimitation panel are anti-constitutional," he said.
Samajwadi Party's Akhilesh Yadav questioned the rush to introduce the bills.
"We are in favour... but why do you not want a Census to be done?" he asked.
Union Minister Home Minister Amit Shah hit back, saying the Census 2027 is on and the Centre has also decided to go for caste enumeration, but reservation based on religion is "unconstitutional".
According to the draft Constitution amendment bill, Lok Sabha seats will be increased to a maximum of 850 from the current 543 to "operationalise" the women's reservation law before the 2029 parliamentary polls, following a delimitation exercise based on the 2011 Census.
Seats will also be increased in state and Union territory assemblies to accommodate 33 per cent reservation for women.
The seats reserved for women in the Lok Sabha and legislative assemblies "shall be allotted by rotation to different constituencies in a state or Union territory", the draft bill circulated among Lok Sabha members said.
Several opposition parties on Wednesday decided to unitedly vote against the delimitation provisions in the Constitution amendment bill in Parliament, while asserting that they are not against reservation for women in legislative bodies.
