On May 4 the government introduced the Foreign Educational Institutions (Regulation of Entry and Operations) Bill in the Lok Sabha that would allow foreign universities to set up shop in India. The bill is fiercely opposed by the communists. On May 7, the last day of the budget session, the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill, 2010, (whose passage is a key requirement for operationalisation of the Indo-US nuclear deal), was moved by Minister of State in the PMO Prithviraj Chavan. The bill seeks to provide limited liability in case of a nuclear accident and was introduced amid protests and by the Opposition NDA and Left parties. The bill will now be discussed in a Parliamentary Standing Committee headed by SP’s Mulayam Singh Yadav, which is expected to submit its report in two months. Significantly, the bill was tabled with the support of the SP and RJD.
As the UPA government has mastered the technique of getting the support of different parties for different legislations, one can only presume some understanding has been worked out with the Yadavs. They would certainly be happy with the government broadly agreeing to a caste census as this exercise has the potential of extending a lifeline to their shrinking bases in the future.
Another very interesting question is: What will happen to the Women’s Reservation Bill, that Sonia Gandhi has staked her reputation on? Sources in the party say that Mulayam has suggested that she should wait till the end of the UPA’s term to move the bill in the Lok Sabha. But Sonia has reportedly told key Congress leaders that she is willing to stake her government on it. She has been told that the foundation stone for women’s reservation has already been laid in the Rajya Sabha and now it’s just a matter of finding the expedient time to move it.
And if the focus will start shifting to legislation that the Americans have a stake in, it is highly unlikely that women’s reservation will be pushed till Obama comes and goes. As an observer of political pulls and pressures one can only connect the dots and come up with an intelligent guess. And any US president is a big dot. So if the Obama visit does happen (and he does indeed snub Pakistan by not planning a parallel trip to Islamabad), there will be a lot of hype and hysteria, but also an attempt to give the Americans what they want.