Cong draws up plan for House session, says GST isn’t only issue

Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, November 24

Two days before the winter session begins, the Congress today toughened its position on the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Bill saying the government could not give signals that the entire session was being called to discuss and debate only one Bill.

“There are several more important issues demanding discussion and debate. It is not by accident that hundreds of eminent citizens are returning their awards against the constant attack and assault on fundamental rights. The PM is silent on all these issues. He will have to speak on the floor of the House like he speaks on foreign soil. The Winter Session is not being called only for the GST Bill passage," Congress' Deputy Leader in Rajya Sabha Anand Sharma told The Tribune today.

Sharma was speaking after a crucial strategy meeting of the Congress, which party chief Sonia Gandhi held at her residence late last evening. The meeting was attended by party vice-president Rahul Gandhi, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Congress leader in Lok Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge, Congress deputy leaders in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha Capt Amarinder Singh and Sharma, respectively.

The meeting is learnt to have taken a position that the government could not engage the Opposition on a single issue of the GST Bill and must adequately address all Opposition's concerns, including intolerance, inflation, agrarian distress and farmers' suicides.

"Why is the government talking only of the GST Bill? We are not against the Bill. We are for it. Our concerns on the Bill are recorded in the Rajya Sabha Select Committee report and it is now for the government to reflect on them and revert to us," Sharma said.