New Delhi: Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and his predecessor P. Chidambaram were on Wednesday engaged in friendly exchanges in the Rajya Sabha as the House discussed the historic Constitution Amendment Bill on GST. Jaitley and Chidambaram, both noted lawyers, took digs at each other over the drafting of the bill and its provisions.
It started with Chidambaram saying the Bill had been drafted in an “clumsy” manner. “I think Chidambaram mentioned that the Bill had a clumsy drafting because it says that some of the revenue collected will not be part of the consolidated fund of the Centre or the States and the argument was that every revenue has to go into the consolidated fund,” he said.
The Minister said that “clumsy drafting” is a “bit too extreme in expression”.
He further said: “I thought that probably the best draft person India ever had was B. N. Rao, who aided Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar. And the phrase which you call clumsy drafting is verbatim the same, if you picked up Article 268 (2) of the original Constitution.”
Quoting the Article, Jaitley said the proceeds in any such financial year of any such duty leviable within any state shall not form part of the Consolidated Fund of India, but shall be assigned to that state.
To this PC said, “I certainly do not claim to be as wise and clever as late B.N. Rao. Finance Minister pointed out 2 provisions of the Constitution where the phrase “shall not form part of the Consolidated Fund of India” is used. I don’t dispute that.”
