Congress uproar in RS over alleged leakage of Rail Budget

Congress today created uproar in Rajya Sabha over the alleged leakage of Rail Budget and forced two adjournments during Question Hour on the issue.

Raising the matter during Zero Hour, Congress members wanted to raise the issue but were disallowed by Deputy Chairman P J Kurien, who said the party's privilege notice was still under consideration of Chairman Hamid Ansari and hence, he would not be able to allow any discussion on it.

Congress members including Madhusudan Mistry, Satyavrat Chaturvedi and V Hanumantha Rao wanted to mention the issue of alleged leakage of Rail budget.

Waving copies of newspaper clippings, they sought resignation of Railway Minister Sadanand Gowda.

Kurien said the issue cannot be allowed to be raised as it was under consideration of the Chairman.

Not satisfied, Congress members continued to raise the issue and were also supported by SP members Ramgopal Yadav and Naresh Aggarwal.

Amid din, Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said as per "well-settled" traditions and precedence, if a privilege notice is issued and is under consideration of the Chair, "its content is not allowed to be mentioned or raised".

He said if the privilege notice is accepted, it goes to the privileges committee of Parliament.

Congress members had raised the issue during Question Hour also which led to two adjournments.