Session ends, Triple Talaq Bill deferred

New Delhi: With the Triple Talaq Bill failing to get through the Rajya Sabha on the last day of the Winter Session of Parliament on January 5, the Narendra Modi government has now decided to bring it during the Budget Session which will commence from January 29.
Union minister for minority affairs Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and parliamentary affairs minister Ananth Kumar, while asserting the government’s commitment to abolish triple talaq, said that the government will now bring the “Bill in the Budget Session”.
“We are committed to it (Bill) and assure the Muslim women that this illegal practice (of instant triple talaq) will be abolished,” said Naqvi.
The Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Bill, 2017, which criminalizes inst-ant talaq and provides for up to three years of imprisonment for accused Muslim men, was passed by the Lok Sabha on December 28. However, a united Opposition stalled it in the Rajya Sabha with the Congress moving a motion that the Bill be sent to a select committee for further scrutiny, a move strongly opposed by the treasury benches.
Slamming the Congress for stalling the bill, Kumar said, “The Congress is doing injustice to the Muslim women by opposing the triple talaq bill. They are not thinking about ensuring justice to the Muslim sisters. They are doing injustice the same way they did in the Shah Bano case.”
The Congress, in turn, held the ruling BJP responsible for the impasse in the Rajya Sabha due to which the Triple Talaq Bill could not be taken up and accused it of treating Parliament as a “rubber stamp”.
Budget session to begin from January 29
The Budget Session of Parliament is set to commence on January 29 and the Union Budget for 2018-19 will be presented on February 1, the Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs (CCPA) recommended on Friday.
According to parliamentary affairs minister Ananth Kumar, the first phase of the session will be from January 29 to February 9.
The Winter Session of Parliament ended on Friday. After a recess, Parliament will meet again from March 5 to April 6.
The Budget Session would begin with the address of President Ram Nath Kovind to the joint sitting of the two Houses on January 29 and the Economic Sur-vey will be tabled on the same day,
The recommendation for the Budget Session dates were made by the CCPA headed by Union home minister Rajnath Singh which met here. It will be sent to the President.
There will be a recess between the session so that the department-related standing committees can clear the budgetary proposals related to their respective ministries.

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