JPC Constituted On 'One Nation One Election' Bills, Priyanka Gandhi, Anurag Thakur Among Members

Several members of the Parliament from the ruling BJP and opposition parties have been named as members of the JPC, including Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi and BJP's Anurag Thakur.

The Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) tasked with examining the 'One Nation, One Election' (ONOE) Bills has been constituted comprising of 31 members, including 21 MPs from Lok Sabha.

The Lok Sabha's list of business for Thursday included the names of 21 MPs to be part of the committee, a motion on whose constitution will be moved by Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal.

Former Union minister Parshottambhai Rupala, Bhartruhari Mahtab, Anil Baluni, C M Ramesh, Bansuri Swaraj, Vishnu Dayal Ram and Sambit Patra are among the BJP's Lok Sabha members to be part of the panel. Chaudhary, a former minister of state for law, is being seen as the likely chairperson of the committee, sources told PTI, adding that Thakur is also a contender.

Several members of the Parliament from the ruling BJP and opposition parties have been named as members of the JPC on the ONOE Bills, including Congress leaders Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Manish Tewari, SP's Dharmendra Yadav, TMC's Kalyan Banerjee, NCP (SP) leader Supriya Sule, Shiv Sena's Shrikant Eknath Shinde, and BJP leaders Sambit Patra, Anil Baluni and Anurag Singh Thakur.

Other MPs from Lok Sabha include Sukhdeo Bhagat of the Congress, T M Selvaganapathi of the DMK, G M Harish Balayogi of the TDP, Chandan Chauhan of the RLD and Balashowry Vallabhaneni of the Jana Sena Party. The Rajya Sabha will name its 10 members for the committee in a separate communication.

The two 'One Nation One Election' bills, including one requiring an amendment in the Constitution, that lay down the mechanism to hold simultaneous elections were introduced in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday after a fiery debate. 

The panel is expected to submit its report to the Lok Sabha on the first day of the last week of the next session of Parliament.

Opposition parties dubbed the draft laws -- a Constitution amendment bill and an ordinary bill -- as an attack on the federal structure, a charge rejected by the government.

The BJP and its allies such as the TDP, JD(U) and Shiv Sena have stoutly defended the bills, saying frequent elections are an obstruction to development programmes and simultaneous polls will boost them by cutting down on election expenditure.