Rajya Sabha interesting facts: Endorsing emergency, cross-voting & more, special powers of the Upper House

The Rajya Sabha 2022 Elections is slated to take place on March 31 and in June. With 13 members of the Rajya Sabha retiring from the Upper House, the political parties of India have braced themselves for the upcoming biennial elections to the Upper House. In fact, the political parties like BJP, Congress, AAP have also announced their nominees for the upcoming Rajya Sabha Elections 2022. The Rajya Sabha is the Upper House of the Parliament which enjoys many special powers and it is one of the key laders on which a write walks to becoming a law.   

With Rajya Sabha Elections 2022 knocking the doors of the Indian Poltics, here are some interesting facts of the Upper House of the Indian Parliament.

Talking about Rajya Sabha interesting facts, it is different from the Lok Sabha (Lower House) in many ways. One of the many differences is the composition of it and its 'permanent nature'. The maximum strength (most number of members) of Rajya Sabha is 250, out of which 12 are nominated by the President of India and 238 are representatives of the States and Union Territories. 

Rajya Sabha i.e. the 'Council of states' is a permanent House and is not subject to dissolution. A member who is elected for a full term serves for a period of six years. However, one-third of its members retire at every 2 years. 

The Rajya Sabha enjoys various special powers and one of them is  creation of All India Services (article 312). Those who are wondering what is All India Service Creation can read further: 

The Parliament has the power to create new All India Services. If the Rajya Sabha passes a resolution declaring that it is necessary or expedient in the national interest to do so with a support of two-thirds majority then the All India Services Creation come into effect. The sole aim of the All India Service Creation by the Rajya Sabha is to protect the interest of the States. Parliament can regulate the recruitment and conditions of service of persons appointed to All-India Services for which the Parliament has enacted the All-India Services Act, 1951.

As the name suggest, cross voting when a member of a political party casts his vote for the party he does not belong to or when the members casts his vote for more than one party. It is pertinent to mention here that voting can be as per one’s conscience in some general legislations or resolutions. But once a whip (direction by the political party that all its members shall be present in the House and vote in support of the party’s stand in the matter, cross voting is unethical, and can invite disqualification of the member under the Representatio of Peoples Act). 

For instance, it was cross voting of two Congress MLAs in 2020 which helped Manipur's CM Biren Singh’s government to secure the love Rajya seat for the BJP.