Rajya Sabha adjourned; 45 MPs suspended for remainder of Winter Session [see list]

The Rajya Sabha was on Monday adjourned until Tuesday morning and a total of 45 MPs have been suspended from the Rajya Sabha through a voice vote for the rest of the Winter Session.

The Opposition MPs have been demanding a detailed statement by Union Home Minister Amit Shah in both Houses over the December 13 Parliament security breach issue.

The Upper House suspended a total of 34 Opposition MPs, including the Congress' MP Jairam Ramesh, KC Venugopal and Randeep Singh Surjewala; the Trinamool Congress' Sukhendu Sekhar Ray and Santanu Sen and the RJD's Manoj Kumar Jha.

Besides them, even MPs including Pramod Tiwari, Amee Yajnik, Naranbhai J Rathwa, Syed Naseer Hussain, Phulo Devi Netam, Shaktisinh Gohil, Rajani Patil, Ranjeet Ranjan, Imran Pratapgarhi, Sukhendu Sekhar Ray, Mohammad Nadimul Haque, Abir Ranjan Biswas, Santanu Sen, Mausam Noor, Prakash Chik Baraik, Samirul Islam, M Shanmugam, NR Elango, Kanimozhi NVM Somu, R Girirajan, Faiyaz Ahmad, V Sivadasan, Ram Nath Thakur, Aneel Prasad Hegde, Vandana Chavan, Ram Gopal Yadav, Javed Ali Khan, Mahua Maji, Jose K Mani, Ajit Kumar Bhuyan have been suspended for the remainder of the session. Meanwhile, the matter of suspension of the 11 Rajya Sabha MPs was referred to the Privilege Committee. The MPs whose names have been referred to the Privilege Committee include Jebi Mather Hisham, L Hanumanthaiah, Neeraj Dangi, Rajmani Patel, Kumar Ketkar, GC Chandrashekhar, Binoy Viswam, Sandosh Kumar P, M Mohamed Abdulla, John Brittas and AA Rahim.

After announcing the suspension of the 45 MPs, Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar said that many members are deliberately ignoring the Chair.

"The House is not functioning due to disruption," he said.

Following the suspension of the Opposition, the Rajya Sabha was adjourned for the day. Earlier in the day, 33 MPs from the Lok Sabha were also suspended for the remainder of the Winter Session including Leader of Congress in the House Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury.

The Opposition has been demanding a statement by Amit Shah on the Parliament security breach case in which a total of six people have been arrested. The security breach coincided with the 22nd anniversary of the 2001 Parliament terror attack.

(With inputs from IANS)