Parliament

A private member bill seeking to make Governors constitutionally bound by the advice of the Council of Ministers of states was defeated in the Rajya Sabha on Friday, with treasury benches voting against the Bill brought by Kerala CPI (M) member John Brittas.

The two sides clashed at the stage of introduction of the Bill, with the Opposition MPs saying Governors in non-BJP ruled states were acting against the elected governments.

Deputy Chairman Harivansh put the motion for the introduction of the Bill to voice vote and declared it defeated. Brittas, however, insisted on a division. The motion was rejected with 56 members opposing it and 21 in favour of the introduction.

Brittas sought to introduce The Constitution (Amendment) Bill, 2024 (amendment of article 158) in the afternoon session of the Upper House.

Introducing the bill, he said the legislation seeks to ensure the "constitutional responsibility of Governors towards the Council of Ministers in carrying out their functions by confining their roles strictly within the bounds of the constitutional provisions".

Human-elephant conflicts resulted in 2,853 human deaths during the past five years, with the number of fatalities reaching a five-year high of 628 in 2023, according to government data.

Responding to a question in the Rajya Sabha, Union Minister of State for Environment Kirti Vardhan Singh said “elephants caused” 587 human deaths in 2019, 471 in 2020, 557 in 2021, 610 in 2022 and 628 in 2023. The data revealed that Odisha recorded 624 such deaths during this period, followed by Jharkhand with 474, West Bengal with 436, Assam with 383, Chhattisgarh with 303, Tamil Nadu with 256, Karnataka with 160 and Kerala with 124.

The Lok Sabha was briefly adjourned on Friday amid uproar by the opposition and the treasury benches over remarks to divide West Bengal and an alleged scam involving a minister in the Karnataka government.

Trinamool Congress (TMC) member Kalyan Banerjee tried to raise the issue of the division of West Bengal, as mentioned by Union Minister Sukanata Majumdar and BJP leader Nishikant Dubey. Speaker Om Birla did not allow Banerjee to raise the matter, contending that Majumdar's comments were not made in the House and Dubey's remarks were part of the Zero Hour mention.

BJP leader PC Mohan tried to raise the Valmiki Corporation scam, allegedly involving a minister in the Karnataka government led by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah.The speaker also disallowed Mohan from raising the issue. TMC members trooped to the Well of the House, raising slogans that they would not allow any conspiracy to bifurcate West Bengal to succeed.

Union Minister Pralhad Joshi and senior BJP leader Anurag Thakur were also on their feet, raising slogans against the Karnataka government.

As the uproar continued, the speaker adjourned the proceedings till 12:30 pm.

The Central government is a party in nearly seven lakh court cases with the ministries of defence and finance topping the list, Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal said on Thursday.

Meghwal told the Rajya Sabha that a total of 6,98,904 cases are pending in courts in which Union ministries and departments are a party.

He said the data regarding litigation involving the Union of India is dynamic and keeps changing.

As per the data shared by the government, 17,779 such litigations in which the Centre is a party are pending in the Supreme Court and 2,53,073 in various High Courts.

Similarly, 2,75,181 such matters are pending with various tribunals.

The minister said the finance ministry is involved in 1,89,289 cases while the defence ministry in 95,467 cases. The railway ministry is a party in 1,14,557 cases.