Telangana Assembly functioned only for 15 days a year, lowest among 5 poll-bound states, says report

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Most infrequent

Average Sittings.

The figures in the PRS report suggested that sittings of the state assemblies have reduced over the years in four of the five states for which long-term data is available.

Telangana saw its highest sittings in 2017, which was for 37 days. However, as per the report every year since then the state assembly met for less than 20 days.

In their first 10 years, the Rajasthan Assembly met for 59 days annually on average while the MP Assembly met for 48 days a year. In the last 10 years, the average annual sitting days have declined to 29 in Rajasthan and 21 in MP, the report says.

The Telangana Assembly had the lowest number of meetings among the five poll-bound states, it added.

However, the average length of a sitting was not available for Telangana, while it had been given for the rest of the states.

The average duration of a sitting for the Chhattisgarh Assembly was five hours, Madhya Pradesh for three hours, Mizoram for five, and Rajasthan for seven.

The longest sitting across the states lasted for 14 hours — in Chhattisgarh — when a no-confidence motion was discussed on 21 July, 2023.

Another interesting stat to note was that all five Assemblies met less than 30 days a year, with the MP legislators meeting only six times in 2020, according to the report.

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50% bills passed on day of introduction

Time taken to pass bills.

All five state Assemblies passed 48 percent of the Bills within 24 hours of their introduction, which means either on the same day or the day after the Bill was introduced.

It could be analysed from the charts in the report that Telangana lawmakers cleared over 50 percent of the bills within a day of introduction.

The Mizoram Assembly passed the highest number of bills — 57 — on the same day or the day after their introduction during its current term.

Meanwhile, Chhattisgarh legislators passed 14 bills in a single six-hour sitting in 2020.

In Madhya Pradesh, 13 bills were introduced and passed over two days’ sittings of five hours each in 2022.

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Ordinances issued

The Telangana Assembly issued 14 ordinances between 2019 and 2023, which is the second-highest after Madhya Pradesh’s 39 ordinances.

Of Telangana’s ordinances, eight were passed in 2019, four in 2020, and two in 2021.

An ordinance is a law that is put into effect by the President of India or the Governor of a state only when Parliament or the state Assembly is not in session.

Meanwhile, during the same time, 13 ordinances were passed by Rajasthan, and five each by Mizoram and Chhattisgarh.

It should be noted that data on attendance as well as questions asked by male and female legislators of Telangana and Mizoram was not available to analyse, said the report.

It added that the average attendance in these three states was 83 percent over the past five years.

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