• Congress leader K.C. Venugopal will head the Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC), which keeps a close eye on government expenditure.

• The PAC is usually headed by a senior Lok Sabha member of the principal opposition party. Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury headed the PAC for five years.

• Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla also constituted other parliamentary panels, including Estimates and Public Undertakings committees which will be chaired by BJP leaders.

• Public Accounts, Public Undertakings and Estimates committees are the key financial committees of Parliament tasked with keeping a watch on the government’s accounts and the functioning of public sector firms.

• BJP leader Sanjay Jaiswal will head the Committee on Estimates while his party colleague Baijayant Panda will chair the Committee on Public Undertakings.

• Unlike the previous Lok Sabha, committees in the 18th Lok Sabha have taken shape mostly through consensus instead of elections.

• The committees have a tenure of one year and have members from both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. They are elected by the two Houses.

• The Lok Sabha Speaker is yet to constitute the department-related standing committees which keep an eye on the functioning of various Union ministries and departments. 

Parliamentary Committees

• The work done by the Parliament in modern times is not only varied and complex in nature, but also considerable in volume. The time at its disposal is limited. It cannot, therefore, give close consideration to all the legislative and other matters that come up before it. 

• A good deal of its business is, therefore, transacted in Committees of the House, known as Parliamentary Committees. 

• Parliamentary Committee means a committee which is appointed or elected by the House or nominated by the Speaker and which works under the direction of the Speaker and presents its report to the House or to the Speaker and the Secretariat for which is provided by the Lok Sabha Secretariat.

By their nature, Parliamentary Committees are of two kinds: 

i) Standing Committees

ii) Ad hoc Committees. 

• Standing Committees are permanent and regular committees which are constituted from time to time in pursuance of the provisions of an Act of Parliament or Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in Lok Sabha. The work of these Committees is of continuous nature. The Financial Committees, Departmentally Related Standing Committees and some other Committees come under the category of Standing Committees. 

• Ad hoc Committees are appointed for a specific purpose and they cease to exist when they finish the task assigned to them and submit a report. The principal Ad hoc Committees are the Select and Joint Committees on Bills. Railway Convention Committee, Joint Committee on Food Management in Parliament House Complex etc also come under the category of Ad hoc Committees.

Broadly, the Parliamentary Committees may be classified into following:

a) Financial Committees

b) Departmentally Related Standing Committees

c) Other Parliamentary Standing Committees

d) Ad hoc Committees.

Financial Committees

There are three financial committees — Estimates Committee, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), and the Committee on Public Undertakings (CoPU).

1) Public Accounts Committee

• The Committee is one of the oldest Parliamentary Committees in India. From its inception in the year 1921 till early 1950, the Finance Member of the Executive Council was appointed as the chairperson of the Committee and its Secretarial functions were looked after by the Finance Department. With the coming into force of the Constitution of India on January 26, 1950, the Committee became a Parliamentary Committee under the control of the Speaker.

• The Public Accounts Committee is constituted by Parliament each year for the purpose of auditing the revenue and the expenditure of the government of India. They check that Parliament exercises over the executive stems from the basic principle that Parliament embodies the will of the people. It serves as a check on the government especially with respect to its expenditure bill and its primary function is to examine the audit report of Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG) after it is laid in Parliament. 

• The Committee consists of not more than 22 members, comprising 15 members elected by Lok Sabha every year from amongst its members according to the principle of proportional representation by means of single transferable vote and not more than seven members of Rajya Sabha elected by that House in like manner are associated with the Committee. 

• The chairperson is appointed by the Speaker from amongst its members of Lok Sabha. The Speaker, for the first time, appointed a member of the Opposition as the chairperson of the Committee for 1967-68. This practice has been continuing since then.

• A minister is not eligible to be elected as a member of the Committee. If a member, after her or his election to the Committee is appointed a minister, she or he ceases to be a member of the Committee from the date of such appointment.

• One of the duties of the Committee is to ascertain that money granted by Parliament has been spent by the  government within the scope of the demand. It considers the justification for spending more or less than the amount originally sanctioned. 

2) Estimates Committee

• The Estimates Committee, constituted for the first time in 1950, is a Parliamentary Committee consisting of 30 members, elected every year by the Lok Sabha from amongst its members. 

• The chairperson of the Committee is appointed by the Speaker from amongst its members. 

• A minister cannot be elected as a member of the Committee and if a member after selection to the Committee is appointed a minister, the member ceases to be a Member of the Committee from the date of such appointment.

• The term of office of the Committee is one year.

The functions of the Estimates Committee are:

i) To report what economies, improvements in organisation, efficiency or administrative reform, consistent with the policy underlying the estimates may be effected. 

ii) To suggest alternative policies in order to bring about efficiency and economy in administration.

iii) To examine whether the money is well laid out within the limits of the policy implied in the estimates.

iv) To suggest the form in which the estimates shall be presented to Parliament.

• The Committee does not exercise its functions in relation to such Public Undertakings as are allotted to the Committee on Public Undertakings by the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business of Lok Sabha or by the Speaker.

3) Committee on Public Undertakings

• The Committee on Public Undertakings is a Parliamentary Committee consisting of 22 members, 15 of whom are elected by the Lok Sabha every year from amongst its Members and seven members to be nominated by Rajya Sabha.

• The chairman is appointed by the Speaker from amongst the members of the Committee. 

• A minister is not eligible to become a member of the Committee. If a member after his election to the Committee is appointed a minister, he/she ceases to be a member of the Committee from the date of such appointment. 

• The term of the Committee does not exceed one year.

The functions of the Committee on Public Undertakings are:

i) To examine the reports and accounts of Public Undertakings specified in the Fourth Schedule to the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in Lok Sabha.

ii) To examine the reports, if any, of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India on the Public Undertakings.

iii) to examine, in the context of the autonomy and efficiency of the Public Undertakings whether the affairs of the Public Undertakings are being managed in accordance with sound business principles and prudent commercial practices.

iv) To exercise such other functions vested in the Public Accounts Committee and the Estimates Committee in relation to the Public Undertakings and as may be allotted to the Committee by the Speaker from time to time.

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