The government and the opposition agreed at an all-party meeting held this morning that Parliament should not be held hostage to continuing logjam over the retail FDI issue.
At the meeting chaired by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, the government told the opposition parties that it was suspending the Cabinet decision on allowing 51 per cent FDI in multi-brand retail and 100 per cent FDI in single brand retail.
Further, Mukherjee will today make a one-line statement in Parliament, announcing the decision to hold back implementation of Cabinet’s retail FDI decision. Both Houses would then adopt a government resolution suspending 51 per cent FDI in retail "till a consensus is developed through consultations with various stakeholders".
Commenting on the agreement, the CPI said this is a "virtual rollback" of the FDI decision.
Opposition parties had earlier been pressing the government on a complete rollback of the decision.
The government had over the last few days reached out to its key ally Trinamool Congress and the opposition to signal its willingness to "pause" the FDI decision.
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee Monday spoke to BJP leaders LK Advani and Sushma Swaraj and CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury to convey the government's decision to put the FDI decision in abeyance.
The BJP had on Tuesday sharpened its attack on the government with its leader Arun Jaitley questioning "silence" of Congress president Sonia Gandhi and party general secretary Rahul Gandhi on the FDI issue.
"The government decided to allow FDI in retail November 25. Till now, I did not get the opportunity to know the views of the party president (Sonia Gandhi), or general secretary (Rahul Gandhi), whom they consider leader of future," Jaitley said at a rally here.
Nearly half of the Winter Session has been lost due to protests and slogan-shouting by opposition members over various issues, mainly FDI in retail.
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