New Delhi: Almost two years into the tenure of the 18th Lok Sabha, Speaker Om Birla constituted the Committee of Privileges and nominated 15 members to it on March 3. The panel will be headed by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP and former Union law minister Ravi Shankar Prasad.Apart from Prasad, the members nominated to the committee include BJP MPs Brijmohan Agrawal, Ramvir Singh Bidhuri, Sangeeta Kumari Singh Deo, Jagdambika Pal, Trivendra Singh Rawat and Jagadish Shettar, Congress MPs Tariq Anwar, Manickam Tagore and Manish Tewari. The panel also includes T.R. Baalu (DMK), Kalyan Banerjee (Trinamool Congress), Shrirang Appa Chandu Barne (Shiv Sena), Arvind Ganpat Sawant (Shiv Sena-UBT), and Dharmendra Yadav (Samajwadi Party).While Congress MP Tagore has been nominated in the committee, he was among 8 members who were suspended during the first half of the budget session held last month. The suspension of the eight MPs came amid an uproar in the House after leader of opposition (LoP) Rahul Gandhi was stopped from speaking during the discussion on the Motion of Thanks to the President’s Address.In a statement, Tagore said that he will not be able to attend the committee meeting, due to his suspension.“I am suspended. I can’t attend the Committee meeting,” the Congress MP wrote on X.In the 17th Lok Sabha, the committee of privileges was formed within four months in October 2019. The 18th Lok Sabha on the other hand has been without a committee of privileges for almost two years after its tenure began.The object of parliamentary privilege is to safeguard the freedom, the authority and the dignity of parliament. Individual members enjoy privileges for the House to perform its function freely without any hindrance. The privileges however, do not exempt the members from the obligations to the society which apply to other citizens.The committee’s functions include examination of every question involving breach of privilege of the House or of the members of any Committee referred to it by the House or by the Speaker. It determines with reference to the facts of each case whether a breach of privilege is involved and makes suitable recommendations in its report. The formation of the committee of privileges comes weeks after, BJP MP Nishikant Dubey proposed a substantive motion in the Lok Sabha on what he termed as Gandhi’s intent to ‘fragment’ India during the first half of the budget session held last month. A substantive motion is an independent proposal that is drafted in such a manner as to be able to express a collective decision of the House.Dubey’s motion came a day after Union parliamentary affairs minister Kiren Rijiju said a notice alleging breach of privilege by Gandhi would be filed with the speaker in light of the leader of opposition’s “baseless” remarks in the Lok Sabha that the Modi government “sold” Indian interests by agreeing to the trade framework with Washington and referring to Union minister Hardeep Puri’s now-publicised correspondence with sex offender Jeffrey Epstein without giving prior notice.Following Dubey’s substantive motion, Rijiju said that the proposed motion against Gandhi had been withdrawn as Dubey’s substantive motion was already before the House.Rijiju said that once the Substantive Motion is admitted, the government will consult the Speaker on whether the matter should be referred to the Privilege Committee, the Ethics Committee, or taken up directly in the House.The 18th Lok Sabha also does not have an ethics committee yet.