A rare committee vote splits along party lines as BJP lauds $200 billion investment summit while Opposition walks out in dissent
A parliamentary standing committee became an unlikely battleground on Tuesday when it passed through a rare vote a resolution both praising the India AI Impact Summit and condemning a shirtless protest staged by Youth Congress workers at the event on February 20.
The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Communications and Information Technology, chaired by BJP’s Nishikant Dubey, saw 10 MPs vote in favour of the resolution, while six Opposition lawmakers from Congress, Samajwadi Party, Trinamool Congress, Shiv Sena (UBT), and DMK voted against it.
The resolution credited Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership for the summit’s success, citing Google’s $200 billion investment commitment and the participation of tech luminaries including Sundar Pichai and Sam Altman.
Dubey drew a sharp distinction between legitimate protest and disruption, arguing that even the BJP had participated in the Commonwealth Games despite objecting to its corruption reserving dissent for after the event concluded.
Voting in standing committees remains constitutionally unusual, making Tuesday’s proceedings a politically charged departure from parliamentary convention.
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