Editorial

JS bodies not sitting

Parliamentary democracy weakened further?
Twelve out of forty parliamentary standing committees have failed to hold any meeting in regulation time thus breaking the rules of procedure of the parliament. In the first place, not all the required parliamentary standing committees have been formed. And now some of the most important committees did not adhere to the regulation to hold at least one meeting in 30 days. They include ministries like foreign affairs, planning, commerce, information, labour, social welfare, civil aviation and tourism, and above all, ministry of law, justice and parliamentary affairs. There is more to it -- committees on foreign, planning, jute and information ministries did not hold a single meeting since their formation last July. The law ministry committee which held as many as seven meetings in just five months did not sit for another meeting reportedly in the wake of the controversial independent anti-corruption commission bill it received for scrutiny.

We are appalled to learn about these non-functioning committees. We have no clues as to why they failed to hold the mandatory meetings. We also don't know what steps the Speaker had taken to have the committees sit, with the powers vested in him to do so. Was the speaker in the dark about it? If so, who was responsible for not bringing the issue up to him? Such indifference is antithetical to norms of parliamentary democracy because these committees are an integral part of such democracy.

This comes on top of a general weakening of the functioning of parliament. Firstly, the sittings generally don't, rather can't, begin on time because of quorum crisis; boycott or walkout by the opposition lawmakers is commonplace and now the apathy towards the standing committees completes the circle. If the political parties of our country really have respect and commitment to the parliamentary democracy, then we hope they will wise up and act accordingly.