Attendance of Rajya Sabha members in DRSC meetings improves, while that of Lok Sabha declines

Ravi S Singh

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 8

There has been substantial improvement in the participation of the members of the Rajya Sabha in the Budget scrutiny by the eight Department Related Standing Committees (DRSCs) of the House in comparison to the members of the Lok Sabha this year.

Rajya Sabha Chairman Venkaiah Naidu informed the House on Monday that the attendance of the members of the Council of States increased to 58.24 per cent this year from 52.57 per cent last year.

Also, 50 per cent of the members of the Rajya Sabha attended all meetings of the respective Committees as against 36 per cent last year.

In respect to the members of the Lok Sabha, the overall attendance declined to 31.86 per cent from 46.37 per cent last year, and the number of members who attended all meetings of the Committees has fallen to 26.21 per cent from 35 per cent last year.

The statistics were read out by Chairman Naidu while giving an account of the examination of the Demands for Grants for 2021-22 of various ministries undertaken by the House’s DRSCs during the three-week recess after the first part of the ongoing Budget session of Parliament.

He, however, expressed concern over the low attendance of members of non-BJP and non-Congress parties in the meetings.

He informed that the attendance of such other parties and groups dipped to 27.60 per cent from 40 per cent last year. Consequently, the overall attendance this year in the 21 meetings fell to 42 per cent from 48 per cent last year.

Referring to several positives, he said these Committees of Rajya Sabha had spent 12 per cent more time this year on examination of Demands for Grants of 18 ministries over that of last year.

“They held 21 meetings for a total duration of 70 hours 27 minutes this year as against 20 meetings for a duration of 63 hours last year,” Naidu said.

The DRSCs of the Rajya Sabha have a total of 242 MPs as members consisting of 78 from the Upper House and 164 from the Lower House.