Oaths and protests: 18th Lok Sabha off to combative start

Over 260 parliamentarians across various parties took their oaths as the 18th Lok Sabha commenced on Monday. However, the first day of Parliament following the general elections was marked by tension between the government and a revitalized Opposition, with disputes arising over issues including the Emergency, the Constitution, and irregularities in premier examinations.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was sworn in as the Lok Sabha member from Varanasi for a third consecutive term, initiated the confrontations by invoking the Emergency in his introductory remarks outside the House. Modi stated that June 25, the anniversary of the Emergency, should remind everyone of how democracy was suppressed and the Constitution insulted. “We should resolve that such an act is never repeated,” he said.

Modi criticized the Congress without naming it, declaring, “The new generation of India will never forget that the Constitution of India was completely rejected, every part of the Constitution was torn to pieces, the country was turned into a prison, democracy was completely suppressed.”

Later, buoyed by their better-than-expected performance in the Lok Sabha elections, Opposition members held up copies of the Constitution when Modi took oath and chanted “NEET” as embattled Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan approached the podium.

Rahul Gandhi, a Congress leader, remarked, “The attack that the PM and Amit Shah are launching on the Constitution is not acceptable to us, we will not let this happen. So, we held the Constitution while taking the oath… Our message is going across, no power can touch the Constitution of India.”

The two-day oath ceremony will be followed by the election for the Lok Sabha Speaker on June 26 and President Droupadi Murmu’s address to the joint session of both Houses on June 27. For the first time in a decade, the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha will also be chosen. The session will conclude on July 3 and reconvene for the monsoon session on July 22.

This session is expected to set the stage for a recalibration of the power dynamics between the government and the Opposition, which aims to challenge the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) on issues such as price rise, food inflation, deaths due to an unprecedented heatwave, and recent examination irregularities affecting millions of students.

In the 543-member House, the NDA holds 293 seats, with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) accounting for 240. The Opposition’s Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) has 236 members, including 99 from the Congress.

Tensions were high as the Opposition criticized the government over alleged irregularities in the undergraduate National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET-UG), paper leaks that led to the cancellation of UGC-NET, and the postponement of other exams such as CSIR-NET and NEET-PG, affecting a total of 3.7 million students.

Controversy also arose over the appointment of Odisha BJP MP Bhartruhari Mahtab as the pro-tem speaker. The INDIA bloc members initially gathered at the spot where a statue of Mahatma Gandhi once stood, before holding copies of the Constitution inside the Parliament premises.

Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju defended the appointment, stating that Mahtab was chosen based on his seven uninterrupted terms as a Lok Sabha member, making him eligible for the post over K Suresh, who had lost elections in 1998 and 2004. However, this explanation did not satisfy the Opposition, who accused the ruling party of neglecting the Dalit community by not appointing K Suresh.

Congress members K Suresh, TR Baalu (Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam), and Sudip Bandyopadhyay (Trinamool Congress), who were also appointed as panel chairpersons, did not turn up for the oath-taking.

The House commenced at 10 am with newly elected MPs taking their oaths in various Indian languages, including English, Sanskrit, Hindi, Dogri, Bengali, Assamese, Gujarati, and Odia. Modi took his oath in Hindi, accompanied by slogans of “Modi Modi” and “Jai Shri Ram” from the treasury benches, while some Opposition members held up copies of the Constitution. The oath-taking of education minister Dharmendra Pradhan was notably met with chants of “NEET, NEET, NEET.”

Leaders of the NDA, led by the BJP, criticized the Opposition MPs for their Save Constitution march to Parliament, urging them to focus on the country’s progress rather than politicizing issues post-elections.

BJP MP and former Karnataka chief minister Basavaraj Bommai accused the Congress of “murdering” democracy and the Constitution by imposing the Emergency in 1975.

In the evening, President Droupadi Murmu hosted the council of ministers for dinner at Rashtrapati Bhavan.