Indian Polity
Consultative Committees
- 22 Nov 2019
- 2 min read
Why in News
Farooq Abdullah and Pragya Thakur have been nominated as members of the consultative committee of Parliament for the Ministry of Defence.
- The committee comprises 12 members from the Lok Sabha and 9 from the Rajya Sabha and is chaired by the Defence Minister.
Consultative Committees
- Formation
- These committees are constituted by the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs.
- These are normally constituted after the new Lok Sabha is constituted.
- This implies that these committees stand dissolved upon dissolution of every Lok Sabha and thus, are reconstituted upon constitution of each Lok Sabha.
- Composition
- The guidelines regarding the composition, functions and procedures of these committees are formulated by the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs.
- The same Ministry also makes arrangements for holding their meetings both during the session and the intersession period of Parliament.
- These consist of members of both the Houses of Parliament.
- However, the membership of these committees is voluntary and is left to the choice of the members and the leaders of their parties.
- The maximum membership of a committee is 30 and the minimum is 10.
- Functions
- These committees are attached to various ministries/departments of the Central Government.
- The Minister/Minister of State in charge of the Ministry concerned acts as the chairman of the consultative committee of that ministry.
- These provide a forum for informal discussions between the ministers and the members of Parliament on policies and programmes of the government and the manner of their implementation.
- The Consultative Committees are not Parliamentary Committees.
- A parliamentary committee means a committee that:
- Is appointed or elected by the House or nominated by the Speaker/Chairman.
- Works under the direction of the Speaker/Chairman.
- Presents its report to the House or to the Speaker/Chairman.
- Has a secretariat provided by the Lok Sabha/Rajya Sabha.
- A parliamentary committee means a committee that:
