New Delhi: The parliament has been paralysed, for first two weeks of the Monsoon session, with a fractured opposition, led by the minority Congress party disrupting the house on a daily basis, demanding, before debate the resignations of the Minister of External Affairs, Sushma Swaraj, Rajasthan CM, Vasundra Raje and MP CM, Shivraj Chauhan.
Yesterday, Lok sabha, Speaker Sumitra Mahajan, herself an 8 time parliamentarian and a mute witness to BJP’s disruption tactics, which they called a parliamentary strategy, decided to conduct surgery. She suspended 25 (over half) of the Congress Party MP’s, for shouting slogans and carrying placards in the lower house of parliament.
Earlier in the day, the Congress Party president attacked Prime Minister Narendra Modi over his “maun vrat” over recent controversies to hit BJP. “Champion of ‘Mann Ki Baat’ has retreated into the maun vrat,” she said at the Congress Parliamentary Party meet today.
Mahajan has, in keeping with her known demeanour of an indulgent elder sister, repeatedly asked Opposition members not to carry placards in the Lok Sabha, but as they persisted with shouting and protesting in the lower house on Monday, the beleaguered speaker suspended 25 out of 44 Congress Party lawmakers.
Defending her action, Mahajan said that she had called an all-party meeting to request lawmakers to stop carrying placards, but they have consistently defied her. “This message is for everyone to go by the rules,” she told the media after Lok Sabha was adjourned for the day.
Reacting to the mass suspension for five days, Congress Party president Sonia Gandhi said that it is a “black day for democracy.”
The Congress Party plans to boycott the Lok Sabha for the next five days. Two other parties – All India Trinamool Congress (TMC) and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) – have also decided to join the boycott to show their solidarity. While the TMC has 34 lawmakers in the Lok Sabha, AAP has four.
The Monsoon Session, which commenced on July 21, will conclude on August 13. So far, every single day of the session has been wasted. But the Congress Party and Left parties have vowed to block parliament until the three senior BJP leaders, embroiled in the Lalit Modi scandal and the Vyapam scam, resign.
The BJP on the other hand has ruling out their resignations, offered to debate the issues in parliament. The ruling party has also attempted to weaken the Congress Party’s position by isolating it within the Opposition.
Time was running out, and the BJP desperate for some progress, called for an all-party meet on Monday to find a way out of the logjam.
A resolution seems unlikely as both sides are digging in their heels. The meeting ended on Monday afternoon without any breakthrough.
