Second part of Parliament's Budget Session begins today amid high octane campaign for Assembly polls

New Delhi: The month-long second part of the Budget Session of Parliament begins on Monday in the middle of a high octane campaign for Assembly elections in four states and one Union Territory. The main focus of the government in the second part of the session is to get the various demands for grants for the year 2021-22 passed along with the Finance Bill which carries various tax proposals. Besides these mandatory agendas, the government has listed various bills for passage in the session which concludes on 8 April. Some of the bills listed by the government include the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (Amendment) Bill, National Bank for Financing Infrastructure and Development Bill, Electricity (Amendment) Bill, Crypto currency and Regulation of Official Digital Currency Bill. The part two of the session is taking place at a time when political parties have their focus on elections in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Assam, Kerala and Puducherry. The elections would take place in March-April. Senior leaders of various parties, especially the regional ones, are likely to skip most of the House sittings to focus on campaigning. The first part of the Budget session began on 29 January with the President’s Address to joint sitting of both Houses of Parliament. The address was boycotted by over 20 Opposition parties, including the Congress, in support of the demand of the protesting farmers for the repeal of the three farm laws. The Union Budget was tabled on 1 February. Thereafter, House proceedings were washed out for four consecutive days over the Opposition’s demand for separate discussion on farm issues. To compensate the session’s lost time, the House sat till midnight for several days.