RAJYA SABHA Parliamentary Bulletin PART- II

Nos.: 49985-49994] TUESDAY, AUGUST 14, 2012

No.: 49985 Table Office

Election of the Deputy Chairman of

The office of the Deputy Chairman of the Rajya Sabha having fallen vacant, the Chairman has, under rule 7 of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Rajya Sabha, fixed August 21, 2012 as the date for holding the election to the said office of the Deputy Chairman. The election will take place at 12-00 Noon immediately after the Question-hour on that day. 2. The provisions of rule 7 of the ‘Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Council of States’, which lay down the procedure for the election, are reproduced below— Rule 7: (1) The election of a Deputy Chairman shall be held on such date as the Chairman may fix and the Secretary-General shall send to every member notice of this date. (2) At any time before noon on the day- preceding the date so fixed, any member may give notice in writing addressed to the Secretary-General of a motion that another member be chosen as the Deputy Chairman of the Council, and the notice shall be seconded by a third member and shall be accompanied by a statement by the member whose name is proposed in the notice that he is willing to serve as Deputy Chairman if elected; Provided that a member shall not propose or second more than one motion.

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(3) A member in whose name a motion stands in the list of business may, when called, move the motion or not move the motion, in which case he shall confine himself to a mere statement to that effect.

(4) The motions which have been moved and duly seconded shall be put one by one in the order in which they have been moved and decided if necessary by division. If any motion is carried, the person presiding shall, without putting later motions, declare that the member proposed in the motion which has been carried, has been chosen as the Deputy Chairman of the Council.

3. Members are informed that as required under sub-rule (1) of rule 7, quoted above, notice of the date of election to the office of the Deputy Chairman has been sent to them separately. The notices of motions will be received in the Rajya Sabha Notice Office up to 12-00 Noon on the 17th of August, 2012. Any notice received after 12-00 Noon on that day will be treated as time barred. ———

No.: 49986 Committee Co-ordination Section

Election to the National Shipping Board

The following programme has been fixed for receiving nominations, withdrawal of candidature and for holding election, if necessary, to the National Shipping Board, motion in respect of which was adopted by the House on the 14th August, 2012:-

1. Number of Members to be Two elected: 2. Last date and time for 21st August, 2012 receiving nominations: (Upto 3.00 P.M.)

3. Last date and time for 23rd August, 2012 receiving withdrawal of (Upto 3.00 P.M.) candidature:

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4. Date and time of election: 4th September, 2012 (Between 2.00 P.M. and 5.00 P.M.)

5. Place of election: Committee Room No. 63, First Floor, House, .

6. Method of election: Proportional representation by means of the single transferable vote.

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No.: 49987 Committee Co-ordination Section

Meeting of the Parliamentary Forum on Disaster Management

As intimated by the Secretariat, the Speaker, Lok Sabha in consultation with the Chairman, Rajya Sabha has constituted the Parliamentary Forum on Disaster Management with the broad aim and objective to identify and discuss the problems relating to Disaster Management and to equip the Members of Parliament with the information and knowledge thereon for making them aware of the seriousness of the issues involved and enabling them to adopt a result- oriented approach towards this critical issue. Dr. Shashi Tharoor, MP is the Member-Convener of the Forum.

2. A meeting of the Parliamentary Forum on Disaster Management will be held on Thursday, 16 August, 2012 at 1530 hrs. in Committee Room No. 074, Ground Floor, Parliament Library Building, New Delhi. In the meeting, Prof. A.K. Gosain, Professor and Head, Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi will make a presentation on the subject ‘Urban Flooding and Disaster Mitigation’.

3. Members are requested to kindly make it convenient to attend the meeting.

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No.: 49988 Legislative Section

Private Members’ Resolutions for 17th May, 2012

As a result of draw of lot, the following Resolutions will, subject to compliance with the Rules, be set down for discussion on Friday, the 17th August, 2012.

By Whom Contents of Resolution Remarks

Shri Vijay “Having regard to the fact that— (Admitted, Jawaharlal secured first Darda (i) the Supreme Court of , place in the th in its Judgment delivered on 29 draw of lot) March 2006, had issued directions to the , to review the meat export policy in the light of Constitution’s Directive Principles of State Policy and also its potentially harmful effects on livestock population, and its impact on the economy of the country;

(ii) on 3rd May 2007, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry had issued an Office Memorandum reiterating continuance of the then existing policy, primary thrust of their arguments being generation of employment, foreign exchange earnings, avoidable rise in the number of so-called unproductive animals, etc.;

(iii) the main petitioners, led by His Holiness Jain Acharya Vijay Ratnasundarsuri Maharaj Saheb submitted their well documented arguments, comprising 13 chapters, covering all vital aspects, to the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, stating that the Ministry has failed to 5 conduct the requisite review exercise taking into consideration the concerns of the Supreme Court, both in respect of Directive Principles of the State Policy and the potentially harmful effects of the Meat Export Policy;

(iv) the Ministry of Commerce & Industry claimed to have consulted the Ministries of Law and Justice, Agriculture (Department of Animal Husbandry), Food Processing, Environment & Forests, etc., before issuing the continuance orders of the Meat Export Policy in their OM dated 3.5.2007;

(v) the petitioners, after having obtained, through RTI, copies of communications from above- mentioned Ministries/Departments and after making in-depth studies, stated that these were perfunctory routine pieces of advice which seem to have no pertinence to the crucial issues as these completely overlooked the concerns expressed and directions given to the Government of India in the Judgment of the 20th March 2006 of the Supreme Court;

(vi) the petitioners stressing contention upon the Ministry of Commerce and Industry that just for the sake of export of 8 percent of country’s total meat production, the Government is following the meat export policy, leading to avoidable increase in the number of slaughter houses; 6

(vii) international standards for export quality meat necessitated slaughtering of young and healthy animals, and thereby blatantly violating the local State Governments’ laws prohibiting slaughter of such animals;

(viii) slaughtering of animals has been depriving the country of dung availability and thus Government has no option but to resort to use of chemical fertilizers and chemical pesticides, thereby damaging the fertility of soil, polluting agricultural farms, water, air and foodgrains, apart from creating health hazards;

(ix) petitioners corroborating their well-structured arguments through factual presentation of their position, stated that a buffalo yields 5.4 tons of dung per annum and slaughtering of 51,00,000 buffaloes would be required for five years to obtain 5,61,000 MT tone of meat for export in the next five years, and that during this five-year period, conversion of 1377 lakh tons of dung would be producing 2754 lakh tons of organic manure, which may fulfill the requirement of 918 lakh acres of agriculture corps;

(x) slaughtering has further led to huge avoidable expenditure on subsidies on fertilizers, chemicals, pesticides, etc. being sustained by the Government of India by nearly one 7 lakh crores of rupees of taxpayers money, this House urges upon the Government to -

(a) immediately scrap the “Meat Export Policy” which is catering to the economic ambitions of a few but causing an irreversible situation of depletion of national animal wealth, especially at the cost of our young and healthy animals;

(b) take effective steps towards avoiding acute shortage of useful animals happening through slaughtering for production of meat for exports, which is adversely affecting the over all availability of essential commodities and becoming a major contributory factor towards rise in prices of foodgrains, milk, etc.;

(c) strictly observe, in letter and spirit, the provisions of the article 51 A of Indian Constitution which lay emphasis on compassion for all living creatures so that Government being a role model for observing fundamental duties, is not seen as the violator of fundamental duties;

(d) stop violation of various State Governments’ Animal Preservation Laws which impose restrictions for slaughtering based on age and utility of animals and also prohibiting inter- state transport of animals for slaughter;

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(e) strictly enforce the already existing ban on slaughter of cow and its progeny for meat export, as the continuance of the existing Meat Export Policy is leading to large scale opening of clandestine slaughter houses, under the garb of slaughter of buffaloes for export of meat, but actually slaughtering cow and its progeny also;

(f) accept the Law Commission’s recommendations contained in its 159th Report, the Report of the National Commission on Cattle, submitted on 31st July 2002 and the 67th Report of the Animal Welfare Board of India in which ban on meat export has been recommended;

(g) constitute a task force with precise terms of reference, for a time- bound Report, having representatives drawn from Ministries of Agriculture, Chemicals and Fertilizers, Health and Family Welfare and Environment and Forests, Department of Animal Husbandry, Department of Science and Technology and the Indian Council of Agricultural Research, to undertake a pragmatic appraisal by doing cost-benefit analysis in totality, as to how the use of dung-produced manure would enhance productivity level of crop yields and simultaneously eliminate overall pollution of farm produce, soil, air, water, etc, resulting from large scale use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, thereby positively 9

responding to the concerns raised and directions given in the Hon'ble Supreme Court's Judgment dated 29th March 2006".

Shri Narendra "Having regard to the fact that: (Admitted, Kumar Kashyap secured (i) the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled second Tribes and other Backward Classes place in the constitute more than 80 per cent of the draw of lot) population;

(ii) the social inequality and deprivation has affected the SC, ST and OBC groups since centuries;

(iii) the reservation policy of the Government in employment is confined to Government institutions and Public Sector only;

(iv) due to the policy of disinvestment and privatisation being adopted by the Government since the last decade, the Public Sector has been shrinking in terms of employment and the job market is continuously shrinking in the already tiny Public Sector;

(v) the state of employment of SCs, STs and OBCs in Public Sector is much below than their percentage representation in the population; and

(vi) there are huge opportunities of employment in Private Sector due to industrialization and liberalization policy of the Government, this House considers it expedient to take immediate measures with 10

regard to ensuring adequate representation of SCs, STs and OBCs in the employment in the Private Sector, particularly the multinational companies operating in the country and urges upon the Government to evolve necessary guidelines/policy and bring a comprehensive legislation in this regard, as early as possible."

Shri Bhupender “Having regard to the fact that— (Admitted, Yadav secured third (i) anaemia is one of the major place in the nutritional deficiencies in India and draw of lot) the group most vulnerable to it comprises pregnant and lactating women causing premature delivery, maternal mortality and low birth weight in India;

(ii) according to recent UN reports, more than half of Indian women in the age group 15-49 are anaemic, a major reason for high maternal mortality rate (MMR) and India contributes to about 50 per cent of global maternal deaths due to anaemia;

(iii) the country has a high prevalence of anaemia because of low dietary and poor iron and folic acid intake in addition to chronic blood loss due to the various infections the women are exposed to for lack of proper medical care;

(iv) despite the measures taken to control anaemia during pregnancy and lactation in the last two decades, such 11 as the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), India has a dismal position in terms of health infrastructure - both physical and manpower and the severity of nutritional anaemia continues to remain a public health issue of great magnitude, suggesting that these measures have been largely ineffective;

(v) another albatross for the government has been the issue of child malnutrition, the removal of which has been declared a key indicator of progress towards the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of eradicating extreme poverty and hunger;

(vi) child malnutrition is the result of high levels of exposure to infections and inadequate feeding and caring practices during the first two to three years of the child's life;

(vii) the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS), the Government's flagship effort in this regard has not yet succeeded in making a significant dent in child malnutrition due to the priority it places on food supplementation rather than on nutrition and health education intervention;

(viii) the recent Huger and Malnutrition Survey (2011) conducted by the Nandi Foundation has revealed that 42 per cent of Indian children under five years old are underweight 12

which is almost double the rate of sub- Saharan Africa; and

(ix) the losses associated with anaemia and malnutrition are estimated to be at more than 3 per cent of India's annual GDP and that the failure to invest in combating nutrition to address these problems reduces potential for overall economic growth of the country, this House urges upon the Government to take more effective actions to control and eradicate anaemia and malnutrition, the long prevailing social predicaments in India."

Shri K.N. “Having regard to the fact that— (Admitted, Balagopal secured (i) the policy decisions of the fourth place Government in last two years on the in the draw fertilizer front clearly made Indian of lot) agriculture sector as a profit heaven for the fertilizer industries, unscrupulous dealers and black marketers;

(ii) the freeing of fertilizer prices has led to the industry cartelizing and announcing prices in monopolistic manner, the dealers are creating artificial scarcity to further hike farm gate prices and black marketing is rampant;

(iii) when the nutrient based subsidy regime in fertilizers was announced by the Government with the stated objective of ensuring balanced 13 fertilization, the farmers and agricultural experts had pointed out that it would adversely affect farmers and was only a pretext for decontrolling fertilizer prices;

(iv) the Empowered Group of Ministers on 5th August, 2011 had also approved the Saumitra Chaudhuri Committee's Recommendations to decontrol urea and now the companies have a free hand to fix farm gate prices of urea and they also pass on any increases in gas pricing and additional taxes or excise duty imposed directly onto the farmers;

(v) a recent CAG Report on 'Performance Audit of Fertilizer Subsidy' found that 45 per cent of the farmers pay more than the MRP and nearly 60 per cent face problems in getting their season's full requirement in time;

(vi) the CAG report also pointed to the problem of artificial shortages created by the Dealers during peak seasons to hike prices much above the MRP and the CAG has also indicted the Government's fertilizers policy for deliberately pushing costly imports and turning away the focus from indigenous production of urea which is a key farm input;

(vii) the present move by the Government to decontrol and hike prices despite strong indictment of the New Pricing Scheme for urea by the 14

CAG is only going to put the farmers at the mercy of fertilizer cartels instead of putting an end to black- marketing and corrupt practices;

(viii) prices of urea were increased by 10 per cent last year and another 10 per cent in 2011-12;

(ix) firms are passing on the 1 per cent excise duty levied in the recent Union Budget to the farmer;

(x) before April, 2010 the price of urea was Rs. 4860 per tonne and with the latest hike in prices it has gone upto Rs. 5622 per tonne;

(xi) in states like , Bihar, , fertilizers are being sold by dealers for as high as Rs. 12,000 per tonne by creating artificial scarcity and the Government has no assessment of demand in different districts and no regulation of supply;

(xii) the Government has closed down a majority of the Public Sector Fertilizer companies and is import dependent;

(xiii) the nutrient based subsidy and plan to give the money directly to the selected farmers through Banks Accounts - raises another serious threat of denial of fertilizer subsidy to farmers of different farming sectors;

(xiv) the commercial crops, like Rubber, Coffee, Tea and Spices, etc., which are not coming under agriculture Ministry (which is under 15

Ministry of Commerce) may be thrown out of subsidy system;

(xv) millions of farmers who are cultivating commercial crops will be denied with fertilizer subsidy and all these anti-farmer decisions of the Government will further aggravate the difficult situation prevailing in the agrarian sector; and

(xvi) the decisions by the present Government come at a time when farmers are already amidst extreme distress and reeling under high input prices and there is a flight from agriculture as it is becoming increasingly unviable, this House urges upon the Government to scrap the Nutrient based subsidy regime and also the decision to decontrol the fertilizer prices."

Shri D.P. “Having regard to the fact that— (Admitted, Tripathi secured fifth (i) there is a huge gap between the place in the demand and supply of power in the draw of lot) country;

(ii) there are certain inherent constraints not only in terms of generation of power but also in its transmission and distribution such as delayed clearance of the proposed power projects, lack of adequate coal linkages, huge transmission losses, thefts of power during distributions, etc.;

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(iii) the present system of transmission through different grids providing electricity to different regions, has proved to be ineffective and is not foolproof;

(iv) recent power collapse due to failure of several grids together has sent a wrong message to the global investors that India has neither the adequate power nor an effective and dependable transmission and distribution system, this House resolves that -

(a) Government should put a smart grid based on latest techniques available in developed countries in place in order to have continuous and uninterrupted supply of power;

(b) in future a system in which the essential facilities like Railways, Metros, Hospitals get uninterrupted power supply should be implemented; and

(c) the Government should take immediate steps to ensure that the large number of power projects pending with it are cleared expeditiously." ———

No.: 49989 Legislative Section

Time limit for discussion on Private Members’ Resolutions.

Members are informed that the General Purposes Committee, in its meeting held on the 28th April, 2008, has, inter alia, decided that the time limit of two hours for the discussion on a Private Member’s 17

Resolution prescribed in the direction of the Chairman issued vide Rajya Sabha Bulletin Part-II dated the 2nd May, 1997 be strictly adhered to.

In this context, it was also likewise recommended by the Committee that a Private Member’s Resolution taken up on a day should be disposed of on the same day.

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No.: 49990 Conference & Protocol Section

Function to honour the Indian Olympians on 17th August, 2012

A function to honour the Medal winners and participants of recently concluded Olympics at London will be held on Friday, 17th August, 2012 at 5.00 p.m. in Balayogi Auditorium, Parliament Library Building. Hon'ble Speaker, Lok Sabha will honour the winners and participants.

Members are cordially invited to attend the function.

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No.: 49991 Question Branch

Results of Ballots of Notices of Questions

Ballots in respect of notices of Starred and Unstarred Questions received upto 3.00 p.m. on 14th August, 2012 for the sittings of Rajya Sabha on 30th and 31st August, 2012 were held on 14th August, 2012, in the presence of Shri Arvind Kumar Singh, M.P.

The results of ballots for the Starred Questions have been placed in the Notice Office and also on the Notice Board in the Outer Lobby for the information of members.

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No.: 49992 Training Cell

Orientation Sessions for new Members of Rajya Sabha

In view of the feedbacks received from Members who attended the Orientation Programme for Newly elected/nominated Members held in May, 2012, it has been decided to organize Orientation Sessions for 18 particular topics in which at least five Members express willingness to attend. In this context, the following topics have been identified:-

(a) Working of Department Related Parliamentary Standing Committees; (b) Working of Rajya Sabha Secretariat with focus on the Sections servicing Members; (c) Raising matters of public importance through Questions and other devices; and (d) Behaviour and conduct of the Members in the House

2. Members are requested to convey their willingness to attend the Orientation Sessions on the above-mentioned topics latest by 16th August, 2012. Orientation Sessions shall be arranged if willingness of at least 5 Members to attend the Session, is received.

3. In case of any query, Training Cell, Room No.228A, 2nd Floor, Parliament House Annexe. (Tel.23034248) may be contacted.

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No.: 49993 M.S.& A. Branch

Availability of Salary Slip on Rajya Sabha Members’ Login Page

Members are informed that their salary slips are available on Rajya Sabha Members’ Login of Rajya Sabha home page. The practice of sending salary slip in hard copy is proposed to be discontinued w.e.f. October, 2012.

Members are requested to access their salary slips from the Members’ Login in future. In case of any difficulty, Members may contact M.S. & A. Branch, Rajya Sabha Secretariat on Telephone Nos. 23034224, 23034228.

Kind co-operation of Members is solicited.

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No.: 49994 Library and Reference Unit

Availability of Reference Notes to Members

The Members’ Reference Service, LARRDIS, Lok Sabha Secretariat, has brought out the following Reference Notes in English:

i) Naxal Problem in India; ii) Farmers' Problem.

Members may kindly obtain a copy each of the above Reference Notes from the Members’ Information Desks - one located in the Parliament House and the other located inside the Members’ Reading Room in the Parliament Library Building or convey their requirement to the Members’ Reference Service (Telephone Nos. 23017517, 23034652).

V.K. AGNIHOTRI, Secretary-General