KC Venugopal – General Secretary, Congress:

Uttam Kumar Reddy, Kunwar Danish Ali & myself walked out in protest from today’s meeting of Parliament Standing Committee on Defence for not taking up the controversial Agnipath Scheme despite our repeated requests & my earlier letter addressed to the Chairman requesting the same.

We urged the Chairman to clarify;

a. Why the Parliament Standing Committee on Defence was kept in dark on the Agnipath Recruitment Scheme ?

b. Why the Scheme was not taken up in the committee’s budget scrutiny meetings despite involving financial implications?

The Chairman turned a deaf ear to these crucial questions & the scheme was not discussed.

No discussion in Parliament, no deliberations in the Parliament Standing Committees, thus goes the way of bulldozing legislations in the Modi era.