130th Constitutional Amendment Bill to strengthen morality, good governance in politics: BJP

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Monday (August 25, 2025) said the 130^th Constitutional Amendment Bill, brought under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, would “strengthen morality and good governance in politics” and serve as an “effective weapon to eliminate corruption and criminalisation”.

At a press conference, BJP spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla said while the nation was welcoming the initiative, political parties such as the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) were opposing it “only to protect corruption”.

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Describing the Opposition as the “boycott brigade”, Mr. Poonawala alleged that they were not interested in democracy but only in protecting their families and power. He said the Bill was introduced in Parliament to remove the biggest obstacles to good governance — corruption and crime.

Under the proposed law, “if any person holding an executive post — even the Prime Minister himself, a Chief Minister, a Union Minister, or a State Minister — is convicted in a serious criminal case carrying a punishment of more than five years, and if he goes to jail and remains there for 30 consecutive days without receiving any judicial relief, then he will have to resign from his post”.

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The BJP leader said Article 14 of the Constitution granted equal status to everyone and yet, the reality was that if a government employee spent even two days in jail, he would be automatically suspended under the service rules. “On the other hand, those who preach lessons of social justice and equality want Ministers or Chief Ministers holding high office to run governments from behind bars. What kind of equality and social justice is this?” he asked.

Mr. Poonawala said that after the Lily Thomas case, a rule was made that if any MP was sentenced to more than two years, the membership would automatically end. “But when the Congress brought an ordinance to save its leaders, Rahul Gandhi, wearing the cloak of morality, declared ‘I am the most moral’ and tore up the ordinance,” he said.

“Today, our government is saying that if any public representative remains in jail for 30 days without receiving any relief from the court — no anticipatory bail, no regular bail, no relief of any kind — then he should be relieved from his post and that post should go to someone else. On this, Rahul Gandhi says it is against the Constitution. So the question is — were you lying then, or are you lying now?” asked the BJP leader.