NEW DELHI: Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Jairam Ramesh on Tuesday iterated that as demanded by the Opposition in Parliament, the Indian Statistical Institute Bill, 2026, be referred to the "concerned" Parliamentary Standing Committee, alleging that the Union government usually refers proposed legislations to those led by a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) member.

 

"Opposition parties in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha have demanded that the Indian Statistical Institute Bill, 2026, be referred for detailed examination and wider consultations by the Parliamentary Standing Committee concerned (which is Finance in this case). Hopefully, this demand will be accepted," the Congress General Secretary Communications In-Charge posted on social media platform X.

 

The "concerned" department in this case, as implied by Jairam Ramesh, is Finance, which has Bhartruhari Mahtab as its Chairperson.

 

Interestingly, Mahtab represents Odisha's Cuttack Lok Sabha Constituency for the BJP. He has been winning this Lok Sabha seat successively since 1999, earlier as a Biju Janata Dal (BJD) candidate.

 

In his social media post, however, the Congress leader Ramesh criticised the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government for referring "bills to separate Joint Committees of Parliament led by BJP MPs rather than to Parliamentary Standing Committees when they are chaired by Opposition MPs".

 

Comparing the previous UPA government with the present National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government, Ramesh said, "Between 2019 and 2024, only 16 per cent of Bills were ever referred to Parliamentary Standing Committees. Between 2009 and 2014, under former PM late Manmohan Singh, 71 per cent of Bills were referred to Parliamentary Standing Committees."

 

Terming it a "modus operandi", the Congress leader alleged that under the Narendra Modi-led Union government twice, in connection to Bills dealing with biodiversity protection and forest conservation, the legislations were referred to such committees.

 

"The latest instance is the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, 2025, which was deliberately not referred to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Education, then led by the senior Congress leader and former Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Digvijaya Singh, and instead referred to a Joint Committee led by a BJP MP. In former PM late Manmohan Singh's tenure, even signature legislations like the now-bulldozed MGNREGA and the Land Acquisition Act of 2013 were referred to BJP Chairpersons like Kalyan Singh and Sumitra Mahajan," Ramesh added.

 

The Bill, introduced in Lok Sabha on Monday, provides for a legal framework for Kolkata's Indian Statistical Institute.

 

It seeks to replace the Indian Statistical Institute Act, 1959, where it being said that the institute will turn into a corporate body from the current not-for-profit legal entity.