Confusion in Parliament as ministers pass buck

A piquant situation has arisen in the Rajya Sabha with the finance, industry and labour ministers refusing to shoulder the responsibility of replying to a calling attention motion on the non-payment of wages to public sector employees.

The issue came up during zero hour on Friday when Gurudas Dasgupta (Communist Party of India) wanted to know the fate of his notice for calling attention motion. He pointed out that the issue did not figure in the list of business of the House for next week, announced by Information and Broadcasting Minister S Jaipal Reddy.

Biplab Dasgupta (Communist Party of India-Marxist) also wanted the calling attention motion to be taken up.

Thereafter, Deputy Chairman Dr Najma Heptulla informed Dasgupta that the Rajya Sabha secretariat had written to the finance ministry, asking it to reply to the calling attention motion. However, the finance minister wrote back that the issue concerned the labour and industry ministries.

She said the secretariat then wrote to the labour ministry which replied that the issue did not come under its purview since it involved money.

The deputy chairman said the secretariat also wrote to the industry ministry, which replied that the matter did not come under its purview.

She said the secretariat had been trying to find out for the past three days as to which minister should reply to the debate on the calling attention motion.

Dr Heptulla said she has now written to Prime Minister Inder Kumar Gujral and also spoken to him on Thursday night. She said the prime minister had promised to look into the matter on a priority basis.

''The prime minister should decide who would reply to the debate,'' Dr Heptulla said.

UNI