India is blessed to have a new Parliament building. Yet, Parliament is not a mere structure of bricks and mortar. Under the Indian Constitution, Parliament is the supreme deliberative, legislative and representative body of the nation. In the Indian parliamentary democratic system, there is no separation of power between the political executive and the legislature as the Council of Ministers is drawn from the Legislature and their survival is contingent upon parliamentary support.

Woodrow Wilson, who later became US President, was enamored of parliamentary system where ‘minsters lead the Houses without dictating to them, and the ministers themselves be controlled without being misunderstood’. But when the legislature is controlled and dictated by the executive, Parliament ceases to be the supreme institution of accountability. 

The founding fathers of Indian republic preferred accountability of the executive to the legislature over stability of the Government. Accountability of the Executive to the Legislature is the lynchpin of Indian parliamentary democratic system. Accountability is about instilling or reinforcing an ethos of legal compliance and efficient practices tempered by the consideration of fostering the sense of responsibility, transparency and good governance, which is at the heart of parliamentary oversight and scrutiny.

However, accountability has become a moot point as the number of sittings of Parliament have come down alarmingly, and the average duration of sittings too has decreased. The 17th Lok Sabha (LS), i.e., the House of the People, on average, had 55 sittings in a year, partly due to the pandemic. But the average sittings and the duration of sittings declined precipitously from the year 2009 onwards (13th LS).  Even the Central Legislative Assembly under the Britishers sat for 74 days in a year between the years 1929 to 1947.

This is deeply worrying if compared to the sittings of some of the leading parliaments of the world. Between the year 2003 to 2012, the UK House Commons sat on average for 140 days, US Congress for 136 days, House of Commons, Canada for 110 days as against average of 69 days of the Lok Sabha during the same period.

An unhealthy trend is the sudden and premature sine die adjournment of Parliament when vital issues of wider public concern are awaiting discussion. This gives an avoidable occasion to the opposition to castigate the Government. 

An unsavory spectacle is the intermittent verbal tug of war between the Members and the Presiding Officers. The Speaker is not a goalkeeper of either side but the supreme Umpire. He belongs to none or to all. The Chair is expected to be completely neutral, devoid of bitter partisanship and courageous enough to assert its authority.

In 1642, when King Charles-I stormed the House of Commons to arrest five MPs, Speaker Lenthall, displaying extraordinary courage, refused to reveal their whereabouts, uttering the famous words “May it please Your Majesty, I have neither eyes to see nor tongue to speak in this place, but as the House is pleased to direct me whose servant I am here”.

The time for discussions on the Bills in the House has enormously squeezed.  36% Bills were passed by the last Lok Sabha with less than an hour of discussion. During the 17th Lok Sabha, 16% Bills were referred as against 25% during the 16th Lok Sabha and 71 percent during the 15th Lok Sabha.

Lord Hailsham,  described the British Parliament as ‘Executature’- a legislative body under the control of the executive.  When legislations are pushed through in Parliament without discussion or without hearing the side opposite, Parliament becomes ‘Executature’, a rubber stamp of the Executive. Another matter of deep disquiet is that exceedingly fewer Bills are being referred to the Committees. 

All MPs take oath to bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution, but the 17th LS had no Dy Speaker, despite the constitutional command enshrined Article 93 which ordains that the Lok Sabha shall, as soon may be, choose two members to be respectively as Speaker and Dy Speaker.

It is said that the citadel never falls except from within. A robust committee system demands a willing suspension of adversarial politics and display of commonality of purpose. When a committee gets polarized, it erodes the very edifice of the committee system. If the malaise of polarization persists, it will sound the death knell of the committee system. 

Some instances of polarization deserve mention. During the 15th LS, the PAC could not adopt their report on allocation of spectrum as the Committee got polarized at the fag end. It was the first such instance in the golden history of the PAC. During the 16th LS, the Estimates Committee could not adopt a report on the metrics of measuring growth due to strong opposition from the Government members. The expulsion of a member during the 17th LS based on the report of the divided committee of ethics, is yet another egregious example. Passing legislation after wholesale suspension of members poses a much graver danger to the edifice of any representative democracy. 

Conventions have a great role in the working of Parliament and its Committees. The Chair of PAC goes to the principal opposition since 1967. The convention remains, gratifyingly, unbroken.  But the convention of the chairs of Finance Committee and the External Affairs Committee going to the opposition has since been side stepped. There is also a lament that the New Parliament building grossly lacks a Central Hall where Members of both the Houses, cutting across ideological differences, met and exchanged pleasantries and views in an informal atmosphere of mutual trust, off the record. 

Parliament must meet at least for 80 to 100 days in a year. Article 85 needs amendment to provide for a minimal annual sittings. All Bills, except Appropriation Bill, the Finance Bill and small amendment Bills, must be referred to the Committees.

There is a need to introduce PM’s Question Hour as in the UK and elsewhere in the Commonwealth countries.

It would really be a break from the Nehruvian past, and it would make a bold historic new beginning.  Also, the business of Private Members transacted on the last working hours of Friday needs to be shifted to Monday or on any day preceding Friday, to ensure proper attendance and quorum in the House. There is a need for changing the nomenclature-Private Members’ business, which is a relic of the British Raj. All members are legislators and therefore have an inherent right to initiate legislative proposals.

In fact, between 1951 to 1970, fourteen Bills by members, i.e., other than those of Ministers, were passed and enacted.  Further, at least one day in a week needs to be earmarked for urgent issues sought to be raised by the Opposition.  The Rule of Procedure needs amendment to provide for convening Parliament and also to introduce and consider legislation when at least one third of the MPs so demand. This well help reduce disruption of normal proceedings of the House like the running of Questions Hour and also significantly curtail the tendency to move adjournment motions. All these measures will go a long way to consecrate the new Parliament, making it the quintessential temple of democracy.  The challenges of accountability are the challenges of democracy and therefore it is imperative that the Parliament holds at least 80 to 100 sittings in a year and deliberates and has an efficacious  and well-equipped tool kit of accountability.