After Punjab government nod, MLAs have to declare immovable assets annually

CHANDIGARH: Punjab governor V P Singh Badnore has given his nod to the bill, making it mandatory for all 117 MLAs in assembly to declare their immovable properties by January 1 every year.
However, the Amarinder Singh government will soon promulgate an ordinance to extend the date for declaration of immovable assets from January 1 to January 31 every year, a senior government functionary told TOI.

The ordinance will add to the lacunae in the Punjab Legislative Assembly (Salaries and Allowances of Members) Amendment Act, 2017 that came into being on Tuesday.

Apart from immovable assets, Punjab in its proposed ordinance also intends to make it mandatory for the legislators to declare their movable assets on January 31 every year. "Since the government has received the file from the governor today (on January 2), the last date for declaration of assets needs to be extended. We'll do this by bringing an ordinance," the officer said.

The Act states that all the Punjab MLAs have to declare their immovable assets on "first day of January every year." According to the proposed amendment, the legislators will have to declare their assets "within 30 days of the first day of January every year."

As promised by the Congress in its poll manifesto, the Amarinder Singh government decided in its first cabinet meeting on March 18 last year that the MLAs will have to declare their assets on January 1 every year. Thereafter, the state government had tabled the Punjab Legislative Assembly (Salaries and Allowances of Members) Amendment Bill, 2017, that was passed by the assembly on November 28. Through this amendment, the state government had added Section 3-AAA to the Punjab salaries Act with regard to declaration of immovable properties by the MLAs.

Also, when the assembly had passed the bill, BJP legislator Som Prakash had highlighted the need to amend the bill regarding the date for declaration of assets. He had reasoned there should be some provision in the bill for those MLAs who fail to declare their assets on January 1 due to unavoidable reasons.

During the discussion on the bill in the assembly, Aam Aadmi Party legislator Kanwar Sandhu had also proposed an amendment in the bill making it mandatory for every MLA to declare their business interests. However, this did not get a positive response from the state government.