“The Parliament which should have otherwise been functioning in its Winter Session is not doing so. Hence, here I am,” said D. Raja of the Communist Party of India, gathering chuckles in the group of about 200 to 300 people who had gathered this morning at the Jan Sansad or the People’s Assembly in Jantar Mantar, New Delhi. And that was exactly what the Jan Sansad was all about; under a tent, with a small stage, were present a diverse crowd including villagers, social activists, students and college lecturers, and each seemed to want to make one point clear to their parliamentarians, if they did not do their duty inside the Parliament, then the common man would show them how it’s done.

The Jan Sansad, which began yesterday as a five day assembly has been organised by over 50 people’s movements across the country including the Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan (MKSS), Centre for Advocacy Research and National Alliance for People's Movements (NAPM). This people’s assembly will be held during the next session of the Parliament. The assembly aims to take forward the demands of the movements and bring to the attention of the Parliament certain key issues that need to be looked into with a sense of urgency.

While the first day of the assembly saw the constitution being explained to the audience and democratic rights being reinstated, today saw the discussion of bills that remained pending before the parliament with the people present. Raising attention to the fact that the citizens often faced a hostile state, active social activist Aruna Roy said yesterday, “Despite these travails, the spirit and structure of democracy still inspire faith in the most neglected group on India, the poor and the marginalised,” adding that they were there in the assembly to re assert this faith and pledge support to strengthen the constitutional architecture.

Amid debate and interaction that increased towards the end of the day’s events, amendments were made to bills that were yet to be passed in the Parliament and questions were raised about why key bills remained stuck with no interest being shown towards passing them. “Only bills that the Government want to implement in haste are being looked into,” commented D. Raja, adding, “The Government is responsible for not letting the parliament work.”

Quoting B.R Ambedkar, Raja also said that people would have to build pressure to facilitate the Government into making suitable decisions for them. And this was a point that former Chief Information Commissioner Wajahat Habibullah also pressed on. Stating that the Government was already feeling the pressure of discussing bills with its people because of the power of people’s movements, the former information commissioner also said that if people did not raise questions, then the parliament would remain functioning as it was. “But if the people became active and questioned the decisions being made in Parliament, then they will surely do as the people want them to,” he said.

The Whistleblower Protection Bill which is yet to be passed by the parliament came into the limelight through the day’s discussions with brother of late whistleblower Satyendra Dubey, Dhanajay Dubey moving the audience with his genuine concern towards the functioning of law and order in the country. Referring to his brother’s death which occurred exactly nine years ago on this very day, Dhanajay said, “Even after 9 years of such a brutal incident, there is no law to protect whistleblowers like my brother in this country.” “It is a matter of shame that this Act still remains to be implemented,” added Anjali Bharadwaj who was the key convenor today.

Yet another Bill which came under close scrutiny through the course of the day was the Lokpal Bill, something that has been in the news actively for the longest time now. Stressing that the Lokpal had to be an  independent body with its members being selected outside the purview of the Government, the assembly agreed to the fact that they wanted the Bill passed as soon as possible by the Parliament.

Seeing over 200 – 300 people, mostly villagers from across the country sitting through the day’s events pushing for a more active Parliament, a sense of optimism does arise for the onlooker. But how much did this assembly mean to them? When asked this, Sanjay Kumar, a distributor from New Delhi was quick to say, “This gathering means a lot to me.” But even more quickly, he added, “But what does it matter how important this is to me, it has to be important to those sitting in the Government too.”