STATE TIMES NEWS
NEW DELHI: Parliament failed to transact any significant business on the second day of the winter session as protests by opposition members who were pressing for discussions on allegations of irregularities against the Adani Group, Sambhal violence and other issues rocked both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha on Wednesday.
The two Houses were adjourned once in the morning and later for the day amid continuing uproar by opposition members.
Soon after the Lok Sabha met, Speaker Om Birla took up the Question Hour, but adjourned the House proceedings following sloganeering by the opposition members.
They wanted to discuss the allegations of irregularities against the Adani group and the recent violence in Sambhal during a court-ordered survey of a mosque. They trooped into the Well of the House raising slogans as soon as the House met again at 12 noon.
BJP member Dilip Saikia, who was in the chair, adjourned the proceedings for the day after official papers were laid on the table.
In Rajya Sabha, the trouble started after Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar rejected 18 notices under a rule of the House to suspend scheduled business to take up issues including the demand for a joint parliamentary committee (JPC) probe into the Adani issue.
The proceedings were briefly adjourned due to opposition protests, and when the House re-assembled at 11.30 AM, there were identical scenes. This prompted Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar to adjourn the proceedings for the day, saying the “House is not in order”.
The notices related to the demand for the “constitution of a JPC to investigate the alleged misconduct, including corruption, bribery, financial irregularities of the Adani Group in connivance with other authorities”, violence in Sambhal in Uttar Pradesh and “rising” incidents of crime in the national capital.
Only Congress members demanded a discussion under Rule 267 after the suspension of the house business, on setting up a joint parliamentary committee to probe allegations against the Adani group, while other opposition parties gave similar notices on different issues.
“Upper House needs to reflect and follow well-established traditions that ruling of the Chair requires reference and not cause differences. I have, in detail, given reasons why, in these situations, notices are not being accepted,” Dhankhar said while rejecting the notices under Rule 267 of the House.
The Chairman also said that for the last 30 years, the House has reflected a consensual approach concerning Rule 267 every time.
“As I have reiterated on several occasions, I thought it wise to bestow focused attention given the situation that we are entering the last quarter of the century of adoption of the Constitution of India,” he said.
He emphasised that the House needs to reflect and follow well-established traditions that a ruling of the Chair requires “deference and not (be a) cause of differences”.
While rejecting the notices, Dhankhar also stressed that there will be occasions to raise these issues in accordance with rules.
Of the total 18 adjournment notices given under Rule 267, at least nine were from Congress members on the Adani matter, while others sought discussion on violence in Manipur and Uttar Pradesh’s Sambhal.
The Congress members who had given the notices were G C Chandrashekhar, Randeep Singh Surjewala, Syed Naseer Hussain, Neeraj Dangi, Renuka Chowdhury, Rajeev Shukla, Pramod Tiwari, Akhilesh Prasad Singh and Jebi Mather Hisham.
However, Sanjay Singh of AAP gave a notice for adjourning all other business of the House to discuss the “increasing crimes in Delhi”.
Sushmita Dev (TMC), Tiruchi Siva (DMK), Raghav Chadha (AAP) and Sandosh Kumar P (CPI) had given separate notices under the same rule for discussion on violence in Manipur, while John Brittas (CPI-M), A A Rahim (CPI-M), Ram Gopal Yadav (SP) and Abdul Wahab (IUML) gave notices to discuss the recent violence in Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh.
Earlier, the Chairman extended birthday greetings to Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharyya, Wanweiroy Kharlukhi and Dharmshila Gupta, all Members of Rajya Sabha.
On Monday also, the first day of the Winter Session, the Rajya Sabha proceedings were adjourned for the day during the morning session itself as the opposition insisted on raising issues related to the Adani Group.
There was no sitting of the House on Tuesday.
The Adani Group had denied allegations of irregularities. It said on Wednesday that Gautam Adani and his nephew Sagar have not been charged with any violation of the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) in the indictment that authorities filed in the New York court in an alleged bribery case.
