Ministers protest in Parliament complex against Congress for 'disrupting' proceedings

The brown Gandhi statue, an unmissable attraction inside Parliament complex in New Delhi, is often a site of protest by opposition lawmakers, but it was ministers and ruling alliance MPs who were protesting there today.

Protesting near the statue of the meditating Mahatma, the ministers blamed the Congress for disrupting proceedings in both the houses.

A total of nearly 250 working hours were wasted before both the houses were adjourned sine die today. During the session, merely five of 19 starred questions were replied to orally by ministers in Rajya Sabha. In Lok Sabha, 17 of 580 such questions were answered in 29 sittings.

Yesterday, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ananth Kumar said 400 MPs of the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) would forego Rs 3.66 crore as salary. He blamed the Congress for the near washout of the second half of the Budget Session.

However, allies like RSPL and Shiv Sena did not appear to side with the BJP on foregoing the salary.

Other than Kumar, Food and Civil Supplies Minister Ram Vilas Paswan, Health Minister J P Nadda, Steel Minister Birendra Singh, and Jitendra Singh, Minister of State (MoS) in the Prime Minister's Office were among those protesting there.

Also in attendance were Shiv Pratap Shukla, MoS (Finance), S S Ahluwalia, MoS (Agriculture), Vijay Geol, MoS (Parliamentary Affairs), Manoj Sinha, MoS (Railways) were among the ministers from the Narendra Modi Cabinet to protest.

Several BJP lawmakers also gathered near the statue to support the ministers. With placards in their hands that read: "Save Democracy". The ministers took out a short march.

"The Congress did not allow to the House to function and we are upset in the manner the proceedings were disrupted," Kumar, who was leading the protest, said.

Attacking the Congress, Shukla said the Congress was doing a "drama" both inside and outside the house and it did not allow the house to function.

"They never allowed Parliament to function. We will now take this before the people," he said.

Singh said the past four weeks were unproductive and this was a "blot" on democracy.

"We were waiting for some good sense to prevail but that did not happen. This is why we were protesting," Alhuwalia said.

Interestingly, a group of Congress lawmakers - Sushmita Dev, Ranjit Ranjan, Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee chief Sunil Kumar Jakhar, Ambika Soni - also protested against the government before the Gandhi statue.

Reacting to the protest, Jakhar said, "Doing protesters is the job of the opposition but we were successful in making the government fulfil role of the opposition.