Former Union Minister and BJP MP S.S. Ahluwalia was on Monday appointed chairman of a Joint Committee of Parliament that will go into the provisions of the controversial land acquisition Bill.
Mr. Ahluwalia is a BJP Lok Sabha member from Darjeeling in West Bengal.
Almost the entire Opposition and even some allies of the ruling NDA such as the Shiv Sena and the Swabhimani Paksha, are against the various provisions of the amendment Bill brought by the government.
The Congress and the Left parties have been specially targeting the Modi dispensation as anti-farmer and pro-corporate.
The 30-member Joint Committee of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha will submit its report on the first day of the monsoon session.
Other members
The 20 members of the Lok Sabha who are on the joint panel include K.V. Thomas, Rajiv Satav (both Congress), Anand Rao Adsul (Shiv Sena), Kalyan Banerjee (Trinamool Congress), B. Mahtab (BJD), Mohammad Salim (CPI-M), Chirag Paswan (LJP) and Udit Raj, Anurag Thakur and Ganesh Singh (all BJP).
The 10 Rajya Sabha members include Ram Narain Dudi (BJP), Jairam Ramesh, Panna Lal Punia, Digvijay Singh (all Congress), Ram Gopal Yadav (SP), Sharad Yadav (JD-U), Sharad Pawar (NCP), Derek O’Brien (TMC) and Rajpal Singh Saini (BSP).
