Chidambaram in line of fire for changes made in the arms licensing

The government is empowered to promulgate Ordinances to tackle urgencies without waiting for the time taken in Parliament amending or enacting an Act. Instead, Home Minister P Chidambaram resorted to an executive order to tighten the arms licensing policy bypassing a Bill or Ordinance.

His ministry has been pulled up by the home ministry-related standing committee, headed by BJP leader M Venkaiah Naidu, for the directives issued to states "in the garb of advisories" to enforce the regulations months before two enabling amendments were tabled in Parliament.

It asserted that implementation of a new policy through advisories "amounts to exercise of power by the executive beyond the constitutional mandate." It accused the ministry of enforcing the new policy without amendments to the Arms Act, 1959, and the Arms Rules, 1962. The advisories contained an 11-point list of instructions to " come into force with immediate effect."

" The committee deprecates this attitude of the ministry of home affairs in general, and the home minister in particular ignoring a six-decade-old parliamentary practice and convention of first laying policy documents in Parliament and then making them public." The changes brought in the arms licensing had come in criticism and Congress general secretary Digvijay Singh even led a delegation to the Prime Minister to protest at the arbitrary decisions of Chidambaram.

The policy was finalised on April 5, 2010 while the budget session was on, but it was not brought to Parliament till May 7 when the session ended. In between, on April 6, the ministry issued the advisories on "grant of licences for acquisition/ possession of arms." The Arms (Amendment) Bill, 2010, was introduced in the Lok Sabha on August 25 while the Arms (Amendment) Rules, 2010 were tabled in the Lok Sabha on August 10, 2010, and in the Rajya Sabha the next day.