Daijiworld Media Network - New Delhi
New Delhi, Aug 4: Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Jairam Ramesh on Tuesday urged the Centre to refer the Indian Statistical Institute Bill, 2026, to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance for detailed examination and wider consultations.
In a post on X, Ramesh said Opposition parties in both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha had demanded that the Bill be scrutinised by the "concerned" Parliamentary Standing Committee.
"Opposition parties in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha have demanded that the Indian Statistical Institute Bill, 2026, be referred for detailed examination and wider consultations by the Parliamentary Standing Committee concerned (which is Finance in this case). Hopefully, this demand will be accepted," he said.
The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance is currently chaired by BJP MP Bhartruhari Mahtab, who represents the Cuttack Lok Sabha constituency in Odisha.
Ramesh, however, alleged that the Narendra Modi-led government has increasingly preferred referring legislation to Joint Parliamentary Committees headed by BJP MPs instead of Department-related Parliamentary Standing Committees, particularly when the latter are chaired by Opposition members.
Citing official figures, he said only 16 per cent of Bills introduced between 2019 and 2024 were referred to Parliamentary Standing Committees, compared to 71 per cent during the 2009-2014 period under the UPA government led by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Describing it as a recurring pattern, Ramesh claimed that Bills related to biodiversity protection and forest conservation had earlier been referred to Joint Committees rather than the relevant Standing Committees.
He also cited the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, 2025, alleging that it was not referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Education, then headed by senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh, but instead sent to a Joint Committee chaired by a BJP MP.
Ramesh said that during the UPA government's tenure, major legislations such as the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) and the Land Acquisition Act, 2013, were referred to Parliamentary Standing Committees chaired by BJP leaders, including Kalyan Singh and Sumitra Mahajan.
The Indian Statistical Institute Bill, 2026, introduced in the Lok Sabha on Monday, seeks to provide a new legal framework for the Kolkata-based Indian Statistical Institute by replacing the Indian Statistical Institute Act, 1959.
The proposed legislation aims to convert the institute from its existing not-for-profit legal entity into a corporate body.