HYDERABAD: The pandemic has hit not only every sector but also the functioning of administration and legislative assemblies across the country in 2020.
An analysis of the annual review of state laws 2020 by an independent research group has shown that the Telangana state legislative assembly had an average sitting of just nine days post lockdown in 2020 as against 25 working days in a year between 2016 and 2019.
But, Telangana seemed to have done much better when compared to states like Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Punjab, Maharashtra, West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh which had only 2-5 working days of their assemblies in 2020 post lockdown.
Many states, however, had better number of average working days of assembly than Telangana during 2016-2019, the analysis revealed.
Interestingly, states like Chhattisgarh, Haryana, Karnataka and Bihar had reported more average working days of 10-12 days post lockdown 2020.
For the purpose of the analysis, the research group took March 24, 2020, as a cut-off date when India went into a lockdown mode to combat Covid-19.
The research group, in its report, also said that Telangana assembly brought out 20 Acts in 2020.
It also also enacted 18 laws and passed four important ordinances during this period.
During the pandemic, a few states had enacted laws to amend the Epidemic Diseases Act (Telangana also made one), while some states notified temporary regulations under the 1897 Act or promulgated ordinances.
A few states also enacted laws to bring changes in elections to local governments.
Maharashtra enacted a law to postpone the elections to the offices of the mayor and deputy mayor of some municipal corporations.
Kerala amended its panchayat and municipal laws to facilitate postal and direct voting for persons affected by Covid-19 or those in quarantine, the research group said.
Other legislative actions triggered by the pandemic included reducing salaries of legislators (like in Telangana) and amendments to labour laws to enable longer shifts in factories.
‘Assembly had only 9 days of sitting post lockdown ’20’
