The Rajya Sabha witnessed disruptions for the eighth consecutive day on Wednesday, and faced repeated adjournments. The House passed a motion to suspend senior Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MP Sanjay Singh. He is the 20th opposition MP to be suspended for a week. “Singh brought disrespect to the Chair through his behaviour,” Deputy Chairman Harivansh said.
Earlier in the day, Rajya Sabha Chairman Venkaiah Naidu told the House that the adjournment motions moved by MPs such as Tiruchi Siva, Binoy Viswam and K.C. Venugopal on Goods and Services Tax (GST) can be taken up in the normal course. “I have already admitted some of them under other motions so I am not admitting them,” he said. The opposition protested and Mr. Naidu adjourned the House till Noon without taking up the Zero Hour.
At 12 p.m., Mr. Harivansh invoked Rule 256 and named AAP member Mr. Singh. Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs V. Muraleedharan moved a motion to suspend Mr. Singh from the House for the remainder of the week and it was adopted by voice vote. Mr. Harivansh urged Mr. Singh to leave the House but the ruckus continued and he adjourned the House for 15 minutes. When the House met again, Mr. Singh remained in the Well of the House. Mr. Harivansh asked him again to move out and adjourned the House till 2 p.m.
When the House resumed at 2 p.m., MPs continued to raise slogans. Some raised the high death toll due to the hooch tragedy in Gujarat. Bhubaneswar Kalita, the Chair of the House, appealed to the MPs to allow the House to conduct business, and repeatedly asked the AAP MP to leave the House since he had been suspended and requested other protesting MPs in the Well of the House to go back to raise their issues. As the Opposition MPs refused to relent, the House was adjourned for the day within three minutes.
On Tuesday, the House had suspended 19 Opposition MPs, including seven from the Trinamool Congress, six from the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), three from the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS), two from the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), and one from the Communist Party of India (CPI). Mr. Singh said he was trying to raise the Gujarat hooch tragedy, where 40 people lost their lives, and was “repeatedly requesting the Chair and the government” for an answer. “I had raised the issue yesterday also. Today, I gave notice under Rule 267 and was repeatedly requesting the Chair and the government for an answer... But the government did not give any answer. I was suspended,” Mr. Singh said.
While Opposition leader Mallikarjun Kharge urged the Chairman to reconsider the suspensions, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pralhad Joshi said it could be revoked if the members apologised and assured that they would not show placards in the House. “We have been maintaining that the government is ready for discussion on price rise and today, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman resumed her office after recovering from COVID,” Mr. Joshi said.
The CPI(M) termed the suspensions as an assault on the basic rights of freedom of expression of Members of Parliament. “It is the Modi government that has been stubbornly refusing to accept any motion moved by the opposition under the Rules for a structured discussion on the burning problems being faced by the people, destroying their lives, like price rise, unemployment etc.,” the party said in a statement.
