Ordinance raj is upon us. Finance minister Arun Jaitley gave us an inkling of its imminent inauguration when he addressed a business forum recently, indeed even when Parliament was in session.
Soon enough, right after the Winter Session ended, the Union Cabinet cleared an ordinance enabling 49 per cent FDI in the insurance sector, up from 26. The ordinance embraces the auction of the coal mines whose earlier allocation during the UPA regime was cancelled by the SC following “coalgate.” Both measures are seen as important steps market-oriented reforms.
They will be welcomed not only by industry and business. The main Opposition, the Congress, and many other parties, are unlikely to have any reservations on substance. And still, the ruling party was unable to bring these and other measures before Parliament and had to slip them through the ordinance route.
This was because the BJP could not restrain many of its leaders from making communal statements which led to disruption in Parliament, especially in the RS where the ruling party is well short of a majority. This was a serious failure on the BJP’s part. An ordinance is promulgated only in an emergency when Parliament is not in session. In this case, what the BJP seems to have embarked upon is a defiance of Parliament merely because it gave precedence to the communal agenda advanced by a few.
