19 Bills Pending in Rajya Sabha — Oldest from 1992
Population control Bill leads list; key labour, seed and NRI marriage laws still awaiting passage.
- Rajya Sabha currently has 19 government Bills pending.
- Oldest pending Bill dates back to 1992 on population control.
- Several UPA-era labour and construction laws still unresolved.
- Latest pending Bill relates to pesticide regulation (2020).
GG News Bureau
New Delhi, 17th Jan: As many as 19 government Bills are currently pending in the Rajya Sabha, with the oldest dating back more than three decades to 1992, according to an official bulletin of the Upper House.
Unlike the Lok Sabha, the Rajya Sabha is a permanent House and is never dissolved. One-third of its members retire every two years, but legislation introduced there does not lapse — even across successive governments. This has led to a backlog of Bills spanning multiple political regimes.
The oldest pending legislation is The Constitution (Seventy-ninth Amendment) Bill, 1992, which sought to promote population control by amending the Directive Principles of State Policy and Fundamental Duties. It proposed that the State promote the small family norm and even recommended disqualification of MPs and MLAs having more than two children — a provision that triggered widespread debate and never progressed.
Among other long-pending laws is The Delhi Rent (Amendment) Bill, 1997, intended to modernise rent control laws under the Delhi Rent Act, 1995. The Bill stalled after strong resistance from both tenant and landlord groups.
Also still pending is The Seeds Bill, 2004, which aimed to regulate the quality of seeds for sale, import and export. This comes even as the government is now preparing a fresh Seed Bill, 2025, raising questions about why the earlier version was never cleared.
From the UPA era, several labour-related Bills remain stuck, including The Inter-State Migrant Workmen (Amendment) Bill, 2011, introduced when Mallikarjun Kharge was Labour Minister; The Building and Other Construction Workers Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2013; The Employment Exchanges (Amendment) Bill, 2013; and The Readjustment of SC/ST Representation Bill, 2013.
Pending Bills from the NDA period include The Constitution (125th Amendment) Bill, 2019, aimed at strengthening tribal autonomy in the Northeast, and The Registration of Marriage of Non-Resident Indian Bill, 2019. The most recent pending legislation is The Pesticide Management Bill, 2020.
Legislative experts note that while some Bills become obsolete over time, others remain politically sensitive or technically complex, leading to prolonged delays in parliamentary clearance.
