Parliamentary dilemma: How can in camera be on camera?
According to sources, some influential quarters in Parliament feel that the video meetings of the standing committee posed a problem as it could be recorded, breaching the rules that committees meetings should be strictly in-camera events.
NEW DELHI: The extraordinary situation caused by the Covid-19 pandemic has led to deliberations in the inner chambers of Parliament on the feasibility of allowing chairpersons of some standing committees to convene video meetings on pending matters or review administrative steps the government has taken on Covid-19.
According to sources, some influential quarters in Parliament feel that the video meetings of the standing committee posed a problem as it could be recorded, breaching the rules that committees meetings should be strictly in-camera events. The argument has led to pushing for review of the decision to hold parliamentary panel meetings via videoconferencing and to decide whether existing rules should be reiterated or amended.
As a consequence, parliamentary committee meetings are likely to be held up for some time, it is learnt.
Sources privy to the internal deliberations said the ‘Practice and Procedure of Parliament’ (known as the Kaul & Shakdher compilations) and the set of rules governing the standing committees make the committees’ proceedings “strictly in-camera”, “apolitical” and “beyond media coverage” because top officials of various ministries and government agencies are required to depose before the committees and present sensitive evidences/information often from internal records.
“Therefore, holding the standing committee meetings via videoconference meant introduction of a new technological element, a third party, with in-built ability to record and share footage of in-camera proceedings to outsiders in violation of the current rules,” argued a source, adding, “so, the rules and procedures need to be restated or framed afresh.”
The internal deliberations are learnt to have also referred to the recent home ministry advisory about security risks in using certain applications and also stressed how the government run NIC platform “too has some private partners”.
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Though chairpersons have the authority to call panel meetings, “the Lok Sabha Speaker and Rajya Sabha Chairman are the final authority on the rules governing the functioning of the standing committees”, a source said. These internal deliberations coincide with chairpersons of standing committees on home affairs and information technology Anand Sharma and Shashi Tharoor, respectively, expressing desire to hold video committee meetings to review the lockdown and relief work undertaken during the pandemic and pending issues.
Some opposition members of standing committees on finance and agriculture too have been seeking similar meetings to discuss state of economy and agricultural work during the pandemic. BJP MPs have not been hard seeking any such meetings.
A day after Tharoor tweeted, “delighted to announce that Lok Sabha Speaker @ombirlakota has approved the holding of meetings of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information Technology by videoconference”, a source in LS secretariat said: “Not yet seen any such formal communication.”
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During his video conferencing address with assembly Speakers a day before, Om Birla, incidentally, stressed the need to use modern technology in the conduct of the Houses to catch up with the times.
