NEW DELHI, Nov 25 - With less than 24 hours to go before the Winter Session of the Parliament gets under way, Gaurav Gogoi has claimed that the State Congress Lok Sabha MPs have walked away with the trophy as far as the performance of the State MPs in the House is concerned.
The BJP and AIUDF MPs are not behind as far as participation in debates are concerned, with Rameswar Teli scoring 98 per cent attendance, according to the MP, who sourced the data from PRS Legislative Research.
�Attendance is a very important parameter. However, does attendance alone suffice the purpose? No. So to make the list of parameters inclusive, �Participation in Debates� and �Questions Asked� are the two logical additions,� says the MP from the State.
These additions change the dynamics of an MP�s performance evaluation. It turns out that the first two places were cornered by the Congress � by Gaurav Gogoi and Sushmita Dev.
The number of debates taken up by the Congress is 70 and that by the AIUDF is 65. The BJP raised 80 debates, Gogoi admitted, but went on to claim that the Congress� performance is remarkable.
Gaurav�s assertions just ahead of the Parliament Session is apparently prompted by the criticism the State MPs face back home over their lack of satisfactory performance in the House.
Gogoi also assessed the participation of the five most active MPs of Assam in debates.
To begin with, Gogoi said, among the issues he had raised his voice are on the historic Land Boundary Agreement, the infamous Dimapur lynching, the Net Neutrality issue, Appointment of CIC, Land Bill and Continuance of Special Category Status to North Eastern States.
Sushmita Dev, on the other hand, had spoken on the need to revisit the Juvenile Justice Bill, Whistle Blower Protection Bill, intensity of religious intolerance prevalent and pending road projects in Assam, among other issues.
AIUDF leader Badruddin Ajmal had raised voice on issues like bringing back black money stashed abroad, atrocities against women and children, communal violence and price rise.
About the performance of BJP MPs, Gogoi said a few debates that Radheshyam Biswas had taken part in were on religious intolerance, budgetary provision in Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana and special criteria for providing water to villages.
Tezpur MP Ram Prasad Sarmah was involved in debates on securing the Indo-Bangladesh border, Central Universities Amendment Act, Recognising Anganwadi workers as government employees and an industrial policy for the North-east, which promotes cottage industries.
Gogoi also evaluated the performance of the �six active Congress MPs� of Assam against the national average. While the national average was 84 debates, Gogoi scored 85, Sushmita Dev 90, Badruddin Ajmal 69, RP Sharma 87 and Rameswar Teli 98.
Gaurav claimed in his conclusion that BJP MPs showed no effective participation as against the Congress MPs in Assam.
