Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Manish Tewari are on the Congress’ list of nominees to a joint parliamentary committee to study the ‘one nation, one election’ Constitution Amendment Bill that was tabled in Parliament yesterday, sources told NDTV Wednesday afternoon.
The Congress, the single largest opposition party in Parliament, has also named Randeep Surjewala and Sukhdeo Bhagat Singh to the committee, while Bengal’s ruling Trinamool – an on-paper ally of the Congress – has named Saket Gokhale and Kalyan Banerjee from its side.
The bill proposes changes to five articles of the Constitution to allow for the conduct of simultaneous federal and state elections, as the first step in the ‘one nation, one poll’ electoral model pushed by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
Introduced by Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal in the Lok Sabha, it prompted hours of bitter arguments, debates, and protests before the opposition forced a division vote – unusual at this stage of a bill – for Parliament to formally accept the proposed legislation.
This first hurdle was cleared, easily; 269 MPs voted to accept the proposed bill while 198 stood opposed. The Constitution (129th Amendment) Bill was then referred to a joint committee.