KATHMANDU, APRIL 28

Acting President Ram Sahay Prasad Yadav, on the recommendation of the government, prorogued the winter session of Parliament from 12:00pm today.

According to a source at the Parliament Secretariat, the budget session of the Parliament is likely to be called in the next 10 days and the first meeting of the budget session may be held in the next two weeks.

According to Assistant Spokesperson for the Parliament Secretariat Dasharath Dhamala , 28 meetings of the House of Representatives and 19 meetings of the National Assembly were held in the winter session of Parliament that held its first meeting on January 9.

During the winter session, the new prime minister was elected and speaker and deputy speaker were also elected. The PM took vote of confidence twice this session.

The NA passed seven bills and sent those bills to the HoR, but the Lower House did not pass any bill.

Some key rulings were made during the winter session with the HoR directing the government to respond on time to questions raised by lawmakers during zero and special hours.

Similarly, the Upper House also directed the government ministers to be present during key proceedings.

Meanwhile, the House of Representatives today formed 10 thematic committees. The House, however, did not form two committees - Parliamentary Hearing Committee and Committee on the Directive Principles and Implementation of Policy and Responsibility, Monitoring and Evaluation due to lack of consensus among political parties. While these two committees will have 15 members, other committees can have 27 members at the most.

PHC is an important committee which confirms or rejects nominees for constitutional bodies, including the judges of the Supreme Court. A source at the Parliament Secretariat said that parties continued to haggle over how many members from which party should be inducted in these committees and that was the main reason why the two committees were not formed today.

Speaker, deputy speaker, prime minister and ministers are not in any of the thematic committees.

There are 26 lawmakers in the Public Accounts Committee, including Achut Prasad Mainali, Gokul Prasad Baskota and Janardan Sharma. There are 26 lawmakers in the Education, Health and Information Technology Committee, including Devendra Paudel, Bidya Bhattarai and Chhabi Lal Bishwakarma.

There are 27 lawmakers in Infrastructure Development Committee, including CK Raut, Gokarna Bista and Lalbir Chaudhary. State Affairs and Good Governance Committee has 25 members, including Gagan Kumar Thapa, Bishwa Prakash Sharma, Prithvi Subba Gurung and Krishna Gopal Sherestha. Similarly, Women and Social Welfare Committee has 22 members, including Top Bahadur Rayamajhi, Roshan Karki, and Chanda Chaudhary.

There are 26 members in Agriculture, Cooperatives and Natural Resources Committee, including Arzoo Rana, Jwala Kumari Shah and Nawal Kishor Sah Sudi. Law, Justice and Human Rights Committee has 24 members, including Mahesh Kumar Bartaula, Ramhari Khatiwada, Shashank Koirala, and Sunil Kumar Sharma. Committee on Industry, Commerce and Labour and Consumer Rights has 26 members, including DP Aryal, Raghuvir Mahaseth and Rekha Yadav. There are 25 members in the Finance Committee, including Gyanendra Bahadur Karki, Binod Chaudhary and Metmani Chaudhary. Former prime minister and UML Chair KP Sharma Oli and former prime minister and CPN (Unified Socialist) Chair Madhav Kumar Nepal, and NC leader Shekhar Koirala are in International Relations and Tourism Committee.

There are 27 members in this committee.

A version of this article appears in the print on April 29, 2023, of The Himalayan Times.