First session of 17th Lok Sabha begins; ‘Modi, Modi’ chants as Prime Minister takes oath in Parliament

The 17th session of the Lok Sabha began from Monday, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is also the leader of the House, taking oath as Member.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Home Minister Amit Shah were among those who took oath as Members of the 17th Lok Sabha that commenced on Monday.

As soon as the House met, the Members stood in silence for a few minutes as per the convention after the assembling of the new House.

When Modi’s name was called out by the Secretary General for taking oath, the lower house broke into thunderous applause and chants of ‘Modi Modi’ and ‘Bharat Mata ki jai’.

Smriti Irani, who defeated Congress President Rahul Gandhi in Amethi, received the longest applause when she took oath as member of the 17 Lok Sabha.

Linguistic diversity was on display on the first day of the 17th Lok Sabha session with MPs including those from Assam taking oaths in their mother tongue.

Speaking to the media just ahead of the session, Prime Minister Modi underscored the constructive role that the opposition has to play. Modi called on the opposition to play a strong and constructive role in the coming days. Forget numbers and work for the country, is what the Prime Minister said in his message to the opposition.

Meanwhile, even though Congress President Rahul Gandhi was not present at the start of the session, the Congress President took oath as an MP later in the day.

During this session, passage of the Union Budget, the contentious Triple Talaq Bill and the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill are expected to be on top of the Government’s agenda.

While the 16th Lok Sabha passed the Citizenship Bill in the winter session of the parliament in 2018, it awaits passage in the Rajya Sabha.

The session is also expected to push for the Triple Talaq Bill that seeks to criminalise the practice of instant divorce among the Muslims. The fresh Bill to ban instant Triple Talaq will be introduced in Parliament to replace an ordinance issued in February.

The opposition, though in a state of disarray, would be raising issues of unemployment, farmers distress and drought in this budget session of parliament.

In Lok Sabha, the NDA has simple majority with 353 members out of the 545 seats. A total of 30 sittings of the Lok Sabha and 27 sittings of the Rajya Sabha will take place from June 17 and will conclude on July 26.