Parliament Diary

The National Investigation Agency (Amendment) Bill was passed in Lok Sabha today. The Bill amends the National Investigation Agency (NIA) Act, 2008.  The Act provides for a national-level agency to investigate and prosecute offences listed in a schedule.  Further, the Act allows for the creation of Special Courts for the trial of scheduled offences.  

Some key provisions of the Bill: 

• The Bill includes human trafficking, offences related to counterfeit currency,  manufacturing or sale of prohibited arms, cyber-terrorism to be investigated by the Agency. 
• Increases the jurisdiction of the NIA toinvestigate scheduled offences committed outside India, subject to international treaties and domestic laws of other countries.

Two Bills were introduced in Lok Sabha today. These include the Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill, 2019 and the Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Bill, 2019. 

The Lower House took up discussion on the Demand for Grants for the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways. The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways formulates and administers policies for road transport, and transport research.  It is also involved with the construction and maintenance of the NHs through the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), and the National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited (NHIDCL).  It also deals with matters relating to road transport such as implementation of the primary central legislation, the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. 

To understand the proposed expenditure of the Ministry and the issues the Road sector has been facing, you can watch a short explainer video here. 

Rajya Sabha took up discussion on the working of the Ministry of AYUSH today. 

Parliament was still in session at the time of sending this report.