To what extent, in your view, the Parliament is able to ensure accountability of the executive in India?

Constitutional design of accountability

Under Article 75(3) the Council of Ministers is collectively responsible to the Lok Sabha, and Parliament wields questions, debates, motions, committees and the power of the purse to enforce that responsibility.

Where accountability works

• Question Hour and Zero Hour extract information and ministerial commitments on the floor.
• Financial committees — the Public Accounts Committee, Estimates Committee and departmentally related standing committees — scrutinise expenditure and CAG audit findings across party lines.
• No-confidence, censure, adjournment and calling-attention motions keep governments answerable, as the 2023 no-confidence debate on Manipur showed.

Where it falls short

• Shrinking sittings: the 17th Lok Sabha averaged around 55 sitting days a year — among the lowest ever — and functioned through its full term without a Deputy Speaker.
• Committee bypass: only about 16 per cent of bills were referred to committees in the 17th Lok Sabha, against 71 per cent in the 15th (PRS data).
• Guillotining of demands for grants leaves most ministries' budgets unexamined, while ordinances and the money-bill route sidestep deliberation.
• The anti-defection law mutes individual MPs, reducing accountability to an arithmetic of majorities; disruptions consume the little time that remains.

Conclusion

Parliament ensures executive accountability only partially — the machinery exists but is used less and less. Guaranteed minimum sitting days, mandatory committee referral, a functioning Deputy Speaker and stronger Question Hour discipline can restore substantive, not merely formal, accountability.