New Delhi: Another 49 opposition MPs were suspended from the Lok Sabha on Tuesday, December 19, taking the total number of suspended parliamentarians since December 14 to 141. In the lower house, only 47 MPs from opposition parties remain.The suspensions came as opposition parties protested against the suspensions of their colleagues the day before, when 78 parliamentarians were suspended from both houses. Opposition MPs have been demanding a statement from Union home minister Amit Shah on the security breach in parliament last week, when two men jumped from the public gallery into the Lok Sabha hall and opened smoke canisters.The Modi government has sought to justify the suspension of the opposition parliamentarians on the grounds that it was decided in the Business Advisory Council Meeting that holding placards will not be allowed in the new parliament.The Lok Sabha secretariat issued a circular on Tuesday in which it listed all suspended 49 MPs and said that they were barred from parliament premises.The circular states that the suspended MPs “cannot enter Lobby, chamber or galleries”, are suspended from parliamentary committees of which they may be members, and no item in their name shall be put down in the list of legislative business of the house. In addition, “no notice tabled by them is acceptable during the period of their suspension.”They will also not be able to vote in elections in any of the parliamentary committees of which they may be a member. They will also not be entitled to daily allowances during the period of suspension.On Tuesday, even as opposition benches protested and accused the government of silencing the voice of the opposition, parliamentary affairs minister Pralhad Joshi said in the Lok Sabha that the Modi government had been “forced” to take action.“It was decided that no one will bring placards to the house. Despite that they have brought placards and are insulting parliament. They are insulting the speaker. They are insulting the country. This is why we are pained but we are being forced to take such action,” said Joshi.Union minister for law and justice Arjun Ram Meghwal then moved a motion to suspend 49 opposition MPs for “serious misconduct”, “showing placards and entering into the well of the house.”The opposition members suspended for the remainder of the session on Tuesday were V. Vaithilingam (Congress), Gurjeet Singh (Congress), Supriya Sule (NCP), S S. Palanimanickam (DMK), Adoor Prakash (Congress), Abdussamad Samadani (IUML), Manish Tewari (Congress), Pradyut Bordoloi (Congress), Girdhari Yadav (JDU), Gita Kora (Congress), Franscisco Saradina (Congress), S. Jagatrakshakan (DMK), S.R. Parthiban (DMK), Farooq Abdullah (NC), Jyotsana Mahant (Congress), A. Ganeshamurthi (DMK), Mala Roy (TMC), P. Velusamy (DMK), A. Chellakumar (Congress), Shashi Tharoor (Congress), Karti Chidambaram (Congress), Sudip Bandopadhyay (TMC), Dimple Yadav (SP), Hasnanin Masoodi (NC), Danish Ali (BSP), Khalilur Rahaman (TMC), Rajiv Ranjan Singh (JDU), D.N.V. Senthil Kumar (DMK), Santhosh Kumar (JDU), Dulal Chandra Goswami (JDU), Ravneet Singh Bittu (Congress), Dinesh Yadav (JDU), K. Sudhakaran (Congress), Muhammad Sadiq (Congress), M.K. Vishnuprasad (Congress), P.P. Mohd Faizal (NCP), Sajda Ahmad (TMC), Jasbir Singh Gill (Congress), Mahabali Singh (JDU), Amol Kolhe (NCP), Sushil Kumar Rinku (AAP), S.T. Hasan (SP), Dhanush M. Kumar (DMK), Pratibha Singh (Congress), Thol Thirumalavan (VCK), Chandeshwar Prasad (JDU), Alok Kumar Suman (JDU), Sunil Kumar (JDU) and Dileshwar Kamait (JDU).Following his suspension, Tewari said that parliament has been “totally delegitimised.”“Parliament has been totally delegitimised. This is to lay the framework of passing the most draconian laws in parliament that will turn the country into a police state,” he said to the news agency PTI.VIDEO | “Parliament has been totally delegitimized. This is to lay the framework of passing the most draconian laws in Parliament,” says Congress leader @ManishTewari, one of the several Opposition MPs suspended today. pic.twitter.com/Uv75gEr4kT— Press Trust of India (@PTI_News) December 19, 2023A total of 78 opposition MPs were suspended from both houses of parliament on Monday, including 33 in the Lok Sabha and 45 in the Rajya Sabha.Earlier on December 14, a total of 14 MPs (13 in the Lok Sabha and one in the Rajya Sabha) were suspended.The 17th Lok Sabha is seeing an unprecedented number of parliamentarians suspended. The largest number of MPs suspended from Lok Sabha was during the Rajiv Gandhi government in 1989, when 63 lawmakers were asked to walk out.
