PAC

Brief of PAC- The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) is a committee of selected members of parliament, constituted by the Parliament of India, for the purpose of auditing the revenue and the expenditure of the Government of India. They check that parliament exercises over the executive stems from the basic principle that parliament embodies the will of the people. It serves as a check on the government especially with respect to its expenditure bill and its primary function is to examine the audit report of Comptroller and Auditor General (C&AG) after it is laid in the Parliament. C&AG assists the committee during the course of investigation. None of its members are allowed to be ministers in the government. The main function of the committee is to ascertain whether the money granted by parliament has been spent by government within the scope of the demand.

The Public Accounts Committee consists of not more than twenty-two members, fifteen elected by Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Parliament, and not more than seven members of Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Parliament. The members are elected every year from amongst its members of respective houses according to the principle of proportional representation by means of single transferable vote. The chairperson is appointed by the Lok Sabha speaker. The term of office of the members is one year.

At present, the 16th Lok Sabha has no designated leader of opposition, however the Indian National Congress (INC) being largest opposition party has gotten the responsibility of heading the PAC. The current PAC is headed by Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury since July, 2019 after Mallikarjun Kharge, who was leader of INC in the Lok Sabha. He was re-appointed to a second term in May 2018.