Confident of passing Insurance bill in next session, says Venkaiah Naidu

Bengaluru: Expressing confidence of passing the Insurance bill in the next session of Parliament, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Venkaiah Naidu today said if there are any obstacles, government has other avenues to pass it as per the Constitution. “Insurance sector - why we are asking for this thing (FDI) is because we need investment, the investment is not sufficient which is available in India. There were certain concerns expressed by the opposition so we referred the bill to Select Committee and the committee made its recommendation, but unfortunately some of our opposition friends started blocking it in Rajya Sabha” Naidu said. [caption id=“attachment_1989895” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  M Venkaiah Naidu appealed to the Opposition to let Rajya Sabha function. PTI[/caption] Speaking at an event organised by the Federation of Karnataka Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FKCCI), he said “So we could not pass the bill, that’s why the Cabinet today decided to issue an ordinance for insurance bill and we are committed to bringing this insurance bill.” “I am confident it will be approved in the next session of the Parliament, if there are obstacles we have other avenues as per the Constitution. I don’t want to say anything, otherwise my opposition friends will say you are trying to threaten us…” he said. “But I am not threatening, I am only reminding about the factual position as far as the Constitution is concerned. If one House rejects, and other House accepts, both houses can sit together and move forward - that facility is there and we have comfortable majority if both houses are put together,” Naidu added. Government today approved promulgation of an Ordinance to hike Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) cap in the insurance sector to 49 percent from 26 percent, as the legislation could not be passed in the winter session of Parliament that ended yesterday. Hitting out at opposition for disrupting the session, Naidu said “opposing for the sake of opposition is not good…what is happening unfortunately is they (opposition) are not allowing the (upper) House to function. That is irony. I feel sad and that too from the people who have been in power for 50 years,” he added. Speaking on the Good Governance day, he said “tomorrow we are going to observe good governance day, some people started opposing it saying tomorrow is Christmas… there is no disrespect to anybody, in this country people have got liberty…” On the issue of religious conversions, he said “government has no role in religion, government has no role in conversion or re-conversion, but my only point is some people are only agitated about re-conversion, they are not worried about conversion.” “My point is after conversion re-conversion comes. So unless you convert one cannot re-convert anybody, so if re-conversion is bad, conversion is also bad, if this has to be banned that has to be banned,” Naidu said. “Constitution provides an opportunity to profess, propagate faith and religion, there is nothing wrong, but at the same time there should not be any inducement or force or threat… if it happens only then government steps in otherwise government should not enter into area of religion….” he added. PTI