Sonia Gandhi returns as Head of National Advisory Council

M.today

New Delhi, March 29: Sonia Gandhi is once again the Head of the National Advisory Council (NAC). She will have the rank and status of a Cabinet Minister. Sonia had quit the NAC in 2006 over the Office of Profit Controversy.

 

The Congress president who quit it because of the Office-of Profit controversy has finally agreed to head the NAC again, setting the state of what can be both an institutionalised goad as well as oversight for UPA’s flagship schemes.

The Congress brass have already begun to scout for policy wonks to sit on the Council, and the expectation is that a full-scale NAC may be in place by April to start scrutinizing the works for food security legislation, besides keeping a watch on the flagship schemes, existing as well as those which may be launched now.

"It will be Planning Commission for social sector", said a UPA functionary familiar with the discussions on what should be the ambit of the NAC-II.

Congress leadership has begun shortlisting names for Sonia’s new team at the proposed Council. One of Sonia’s party colleagues is likely to be on the panel.

The agenda for the revived NAC seems to be in order, with Food Security Act, Communal Violence Bill and the proposed national law on health and water seen as priorities.

Sonia quit the NAC after the Opposition alleged that she had violated the `office of profit’ principle, like Jaya Bachchan who lost her Rajya Sabha seat on the ground that she had breached the rule requiring MPs not to hold offices of profit during their tenure.

She also resigned her Lok Sabha seat to successfully seek a fresh election from Rae Bareli.

The party leadership decided against restoring the NAC when Manmohan Singh started his 2nd innings as it was apprehensive of the petitions challenging the ’office of profit’ law pending before the Supreme Court.

Her nod comes after much persuasion from colleagues and legal experts that there are no issues involved in her return to the crucial job.

FSA is the mascot of UPA-2’s "aam aadmi" plank, like NREGA was in its previous version.The Communal Violence Bill has been flagged as next big thing on the party’s policy menu. The proposed law gained traction when the ATR on the Liberhan Commission probing Babri demolition spoke of it.

The key laws are likely to lend strong weightage to the NAC in its second avatar.

Resentment among civil society activists that improvisations in MNREGA were diluting the focus of job scheme and a failure of the government to allay those fears have raised hackles in the party. The rising criticism over delay of ’aam aadmi’ measures like FSA and Communal Violence Bill could see NAC leadning on the government to speed up..

It was a shrewd political strategy which led to the creation of NAC in 2004. While the government had a professed "aam aadmi" face, it was felt the party could appropriate the social dissent by partnering the civil society in policy planning.

The role played by NAC in the enactment of the Right to Informatoin Act, National Rural Employment Gurantee Scheme- a big pro-rural poor measure- and the Forest Rights Act to give land titles to traditional forestdwellers, helped Congress with its pro-poor branding.

In the absence of the Council, Congress leadership let the ministries work on policy issues,with senior leaders being asked to formulate drafts as party inputs.

But the gaps stayed, at least in perception. There were probing questions when the otherwise historic Right to Education came under fire from disability activists who said the law did not take care of the handicapped.

It is also felt that the NAC maintains a continued dialogue with the society through activists on board which, given the contrast with government’s opaque ways, helps politically