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EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE
NEW DELHI, Dec 3: Home Minister L K Advani today said that the controversial insurance Bill was likely to be referred to a parliamentary committee after it was introduced. As a rule, all important Bills go to such a committee, he told reporters in his first informal chat with the press after his party's electoral rout.
Advani's statement is the first indication from a senior government minister that the swadeshi lobby has succeeded in scuttling a major reform step. Sending the insurance bill to a standing committee would virtually put it into cold storage.
His admission comes on day when the opposition to the controversial Insurance Regulatory Authority Bill intensified within the ruling coalition and the Swadeshi Jagaran Manch, the economic arm of the RSS, blasted the Vajpayee Government for its plans to open the insurance sector to foreign investment.
The Government's plans to introduce the bill received a jolt with the Samata Party and Shiv Sena, two important allies of the BJP, joining the ranks ofthose opposing it. ``We're totally opposed to the bill,'' asserted Samata Party spokesman Digvijay Singh who maintained that Samata president George Fernandes had expressed his opposition to the bill in the cabinet meeting which cleared the proposal to allow upto 40 per cent foreign equity.
His sentiments were echoed by Sena MP Madhukar Sarpotdar who argued that the decision was not a part of the National Agenda for Governance and had never been discussed by the coordination committee.
The Government's embarrassment over the controversy was compounded by the presence of three BJP MPs at the SJM demonstration including K R Malkani and Virendra Singh. Singh later told correspondents that he would defy the party whip should the Bill be introduced in Parliament. ``I am prepared to resign on this issue,'' he declared.
The SJM demonstration was small in size but it included members of several RSS wings including the Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, the Bharatiya Kisan Sangh and the Akhil Bharatiya VidhyarthiParishad.
While the Manch's mentor, RSS joint general secretary K S Sudarshan, did not participate in the demonstration, BMS leader Dattopant Thengadi did, giving the small turnout a high profile in terms of backing from the Sangh.
Thengadi is among the top five in the RSS hierarchy and he did not spare the Vajpayee Government. He accused it of ``buckling under foreign pressure'' and said the move to allow foreign companies into the insurance sector was a direct fallout of the Jaswant Singh-Strobe Talbot talks. ``(The decision) is anti-national and anti-poor,'' he declared, adding that the Government had committed itself to swadeshi in its NAG but was now doing exactly the opposite.
Later Advani told correspondents that the views of those against the Bill within the party were justified as the BJP had opposed it in the previous Lok Sabha. He added that the Bill as such had not been finalised yet and the views of the SJM would be taken into account while preparing the draft.
He said the MPs would alsobe briefed fully on the provisions of the Bill before it was introduced in Parliament.
Meanwhile, it is unlikely that the Bill will be introduced in the Lok Sabha on Monday or Tuesday, as claimed by Parliamentary Affairs Minister Madan Lal Khurana yesterday. Until this evening, the Finance Ministry had not sent a notice to the Lok Sabha Secretariat for introduction of the Bill. Normally a one-month notice is required for introducing a Bill.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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