New Delhi: With no let up in protests by opposition MPs over their demand for a statement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah on last week’s Parliament security breach, another 49 MPs were suspended from Lok Sabha Tuesday, taking the total number of suspended MPs in both Houses to 141 in less than a week.
This is almost one-fifth of the combined strength of both the Houses, and 41 percent of all Opposition MPs.
With Tuesday’s action, 48 percent of the total opposition MPs in Lok Sabha stand suspended for the remainder of the winter session that will end Friday — a record of sorts in India’s parliamentary history. Of the total 522 MPs in Lok Sabha currently the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has 290 MPs, while the National Democratic Alliance (NDA, consisting of BJP, plus allies) has 324 MPs.
The remaining 198 MPs are from the Opposition, including those from parties like Biju Janata Dal, All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and Yuvajana Sramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP), which are friendly with the ruling NDA. Leaving out the opposition parties which are friendly to NDA, just 47 Opposition MPs now remain in Lok Sabha, following Tuesday’s suspensions.
In Rajya Sabha, 32 percent of the total opposition MPs stand suspended since Thursday. Currently, the total strength of the Rajya Sabha is 238. Of this BJP has 93 MPs, while the remaining 145 are members from opposition parties (including parties that are friendly to the BJP), nominated members, and Independent members. In Rajya Sabha, 99 Opposition MPs remained in the House, as of Tuesday.
Earlier Tuesday, addressing the BJP parliamentary party meeting, Prime Minister Narendra Modi slammed opposition parties over their protests in the Parliament.
Modi claimed that they (opposition) are ‘frustrated’ by the recent assembly election losses and hence are disrupting the Parliament proceedings.
BJP sources told ThePrint that expressing concern over the security breach that took place in the Parliament, Modi told the party MPs that such acts need to be condemned but claimed that the Opposition is busy giving it a “political” colour.
“The PM said that it is worrisome that the Opposition is in fact indirectly justifying the action of those who carried out the act. He also said that the way the Opposition has been conducting itself will ensure its numbers will go down further in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. While the empty seats you see today in the parliament will be filled by BJP MPs,” a BJP source present in the meeting said.
The Prime Minister asked the BJP leaders to ‘expose’ the Opposition but by maintaining decorum.
Two men with smoke cannisters jumped onto the Lok Sabha benches from the visitors’ gallery last week, Wednesday, raising questions about lapses in the Parliament’s security protocols. The two are said to be part of a social media group and had “planned the incident for months”, as has been reported by ThePrint. Six people have been arrested in the case, while one is being questioned.
Last week’s incident came on the anniversary of the 2001 Parliament attack, which had killed eight security personnel and a gardener.
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‘Must be a limit’
On Tuesday both Houses of Parliament witnessed pandemonium soon after they met.
Lok Sabha was adjourned multiple times soon after it convened at 11 a.m.
Soon after the House proceedings started, opposition MPs started shouting slogans and displaying placards in the well of the house facing the chair, BJP MP Rajendra Aggarwal to announce their suspension. Among those suspended are Congress’s Shashi Tharoor and Manish Tewari, Nationalist Congress Party’s Supriya Sule, Bahujan Samaj Party’s Danish Ali, National Conference’s Farooq Abdullah, Trinamool Congress’s Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Janata Dal (United)’s Rajeev Ranjan Singh among others.
The Rajya Sabha proceedings were also adjourned twice with Chairman Jagdeep Dhankar slamming the Opposition, including Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee for mimicking him outside the Parliament Tuesday, though he did not mention either MP by name.
“Sometime back I saw it on a TV channel.. Girawat ki koi hadd nahi hai [there’s no limit to how much they have stopped].. One of your big leaders was filming unparliamentary behaviour of an MP. I can only say this sadbudhi aaye [may good sense prevail]. There must be a limit.. At least spare some places,” said Dhankar.
“Imagine a senior leader of your party videographing another member’s [of another party] mimicry of the chairman, mimicry of the Speaker, how ridiculous, how shameful, how unacceptable,” Dhankar said before adjourning the House till 2 p.m.
As Parliamentary proceedings resumed Monday after the weekend, amidst deadlock over the security breach, 78 MPs were suspended from both the Houses after the Opposition remained adamant on debate over Parliament intrusion and stormed the well in both Houses.
Both Houses have seen limited business since the security breach episode on 13 December. But the treasury benches did manage to pass important bills even amid the din, including the Telecommunication bill, Post Office bill in Lok Sabha and the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Bill in Rajya Sabha.
(Edited by Poulomi Banerjee)
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