Legislative Council In Odisha? Centre Says No Idea

Bhubaneswar: The ruling Biju Janata Dal’s efforts to establish a legislative council in Odisha seems to have run into rough weather with the Centre on Thursday denying having received any resolution from the state regarding the same.

In a written to a question from BJD MP Prasanna Acharya in the Rajya Sabha, Union Minister for Law and Justice Kiren Rijiju said as per record no such resolution had been received to create a legislative council in Odisha. “However, the information is being collected from the state government of Odisha as regards to the adoption of the resolution,” he added.

The Centre’s response is expected to cause a political stir here as the state Assembly had in 2018 passed a resolution to set up a legislative council. The state cabinet, headed by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, too, had approved the proposal to have a 49-member (one-third of the state Assembly) legislative council.

However, the Centre has not yet taken any decision on setting up a bicameral legislature in Odisha. Similar proposals from other states like Assam, Rajasthan and West Bengal are also pending. Six states, namely, Bihar, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh, have legislative councils.

Incidentally, in November 2019 the BJD had urged the Centre to bring a resolution in the Rajya Sabha to create a legislative council in Odisha. Acharya had then said the state Assembly’s resolution is pending with the Union government and requested the Centre to pass a resolution to that effect in the Upper House. In 2019, then parliamentary affairs minister Bikram Arukh too had said the state’s proposal is pending with the central government.

In 2015, the state government set up a committee to study Vidhan Parishads in other states. Subsequently, the panel after visiting Bihar, Telangana, Karnataka and Maharashtra, submitted its report on setting up a legislative council to the Chief Minister.