The Lok Sabha Internship Programme, launched in January 2008, is aimed at providing an opportunity to young men and women with outstanding academic and extra-curricular achievements to acquaint themselves with the working of parliamentary democracy and democratic institutions in general and specifically about our parliamentary system.
The Programme will enable the Interns to understand and appreciate the working of Parliament and parliamentary democracy, besides exposing them to various aspects of practices and procedures of Parliament. In the process, it will help the Interns to gain a sound understanding about the pre-eminent position of Parliament in our democratic set-up as a multi-functional institution with a variety of functions to perform, like law making, securing financial accountability, ensuring Executive accountability, constituent functions, representational role, educational role, national integrational role and also as a grievance redressal mechanism.
Five Interns are selected every year for the Programme, which is monitored by an Internship Committee constituted by the Hon’ble Speaker. The Programme normally commences in January of every year and concludes in December. The Internship is open to Indian citizens between 21 and 28 years of age. The selected Interns are provided a monthly stipend and a one-time stationery allowance, apart from access to the Parliament Library collections.
Advertisements inviting applications for the Internship Programme are released in October-November in major national dailies and regional language newspapers. The Bureau also writes to Universities across the country, requesting them to bring the Programme to the notice of interested students. The advertisement is released on the Lok Sabha Website as well.