JPC on ‘One Nation, One Election’ Bills holds its first meeting
The 39-member Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) held its first meeting on the Bills related to ‘One Nation, One Election’ here on Wednesday where all the members expressed their views.
The panel is mandated to review The Constitution (One Hundred and Twenty-Ninth) Amendment Bill, 2024 and The Union Territories Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2024, which aim to align elections at the national and state levels.
After the meeting, BJP MP P P Chaudhary, who is the Chairperson of the JPC, said in a post on X, “Chaired the first meeting of the Joint Parliamentary Committee on ‘One Nation, One Election’ bills in Delhi and took the views of all the respected members of the committee.”
He further said that at the beginning of the meeting, Law Ministry officials gave a detailed presentation on the provisions of the Bills.
The JPC comprises 39 members, with 27 from Lok Sabha and 12 from Rajya Sabha. Among the members of the JPC are Priyanka Gandhi Vadra (Congress), Anurag Thakur and Anil Baluni (BJP), and other Opposition leaders including Kalyan Banerjee (TMC), and Dharmendra Yadav (Samajwadi Party).
Ahead of the first JPC meeting, Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut raised strong objections to the One Nation, One Election Bills, warning that it could pave the way for a consolidated political system under a single party and leader.
Talking to a news agency, Raut said, “One Nation One Election Bills will head to ‘One Party, One Election’ and ‘One Leader. One Election’. So, all of us, including the INDIA alliance, have opposed the Bills.”