Manoj Jha: RJD's Manoj Jha 'unhappy' with bigger opposition parties -GROWMUDRA

RJD's Manoj Jha 'unhappy' with bigger opposition parties

28 Dec , 2021 By : monika singh

The RJD's Rajya Sabha member Manoj Jha raised questions on both the government and the bigger opposition parties for not playing a constructive role in the functioning of Parliament during the winter session. Most of the winter session was washed out because of the suspension of 12 Rajya Sabha members from the Upper House and a truce could not be reached between the government and the opposition.
"Disruptions resulted in a headline the next day that the government passed the bill and the opposition boycotted. People didn't get to know what the opposition's view was," Jha told ET in an exclusive interaction. "A larger message is to the ruling party, but a smaller message is also to the opposition that we are passing through a very difficult time, a kind of dark tunnel, and we all must always work hard to have a source of light. If we choke the source of light that is Parliament, we don't have many options left."

Jha specially mentioned the Elections Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2021, which proposes linking the voter identification card to Aadhaar card. "This is one bill which might lead to a compromise in our electoral process. We know the biggest beneficiary of the electoral bonds is the BJP. Now data shall be a monopoly and we all know the importance of this data," said Jha. "We should have raised these issues but we couldn't. This regret should be seen in the large context of how the ruling party has brought Parliament to this stage."
Jha said Rajya Sabha chairman Venkaiah Naidu was willing to resolve the deadlock and that he gave directions to each side, even a basic tutorial as to how it can be resolved, giving instances of the past. However, the BJP was in no mood to do so, he said.

Without naming Congress and Trinamool Congress, he also raised the issue of rivalry and contradictions between the bigger opposition parties. "There used to be certain points of contradiction between the political parties, which one can understand. There were contradictions within political parties and those contradictions were much more visible on certain days, and that is why they couldn't be resolved. Many opposition parties in the opposition wanted to see things differently, but they could have been resolved," he said.

"I am not naming any party. But your idea of enhancing your footprint shouldn't result in a situation where the best footprints in parliamentary discourse are lost. Fight state elections but never allow that politics to disturb the political rhythm of unity inside the House," he said.
"Smaller parties like us get very little time and if that is also lost, we feel helpless," he said.