Joint House panel on 3 Bills a ‘farce’, TMC won’t send member: Derek

Calling it a “farce”, the Trinamool Congress on Saturday said it will not send any member to the Joint Committee of Parliament formed to look into the three Bills, which seek to remove Central and state ministers facing allegations of corruption or serious offences.

The Government of UTs (Amendment) Bill 2025, the Constitution (One Hundred And Thirtieth Amendment) Bill 2025, and the J&K Reorganisation (Amendment) Bill 2025 were introduced in the Lok Sabha by Home Minister Amit Shah amid protests and sloganeering from the Opposition Wednesday. The Bills were then referred to a joint House panel. “We oppose the 130th Constitution Amendment Bill at the stage of introduction, and in our view JPC is a farce. So, we aren’t nominating anyone from AITC,” the party said in a statement.

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TMC’s parliamentary leader in Rajya Sabha Derek O’Brien said “Modi-Shah (PM Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah) have turned Parliament JPCs into stunts”. “The Modi coalition pushing to form this JPC to examine an ‘unconstitutional Bill’ is a stunt performed to create a distraction from Special Intensive Revision (of voter rolls). Someone needed to call a stunt a stunt. I am glad we did,” said the TMC MP. He said such “committees skewed towards the ruling majority because of their numbers in the House”.

“In almost every JPC there is no consensus on the final report” and “whenever important amendments proposed by an Opposition MP, they are defeated in the committee by a show of hands”.