INDIA bloc leaders march from Parliament to Vijay Chowk, slam govt on security breach issue

New Delhi, Dec 21 (IANS) INDIA bloc MPs on Thursday marched from Parliament to Vijay Chowk to protest against the suspension of 143 MPs, and said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah speaking outside the House was a breach of privilege case.

The INDIA parties also slammed the government after Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pralhad Joshi along with 120 MPs kept standing in the Rajya Sabha and shouted slogans on the Vice President mimicry issue.

The INDIA parties started their march from the old Parliament building where all of the suspended MPs were also present. They raised slogans against the government and carried placards that read, '141 MPs suspended, is this mother of democracy' and others.

Speaking to the media, Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge slammed the government and said, "Today we are staging a protest against the government. The government and Modiji do not want the House to run. But I apologise as the Chairman has raised the issue (mimicry issue) by bringing on the caste lines."

He said that in democracy it is our right to speak and bring the feelings of the people of the country to Parliament and that was what we were doing.

"But what happened in Lok Sabha (security breach), we wanted to raise the issue in both the Houses about how the security breach took place, who is responsible and tell the House why it happened," he said.

He said, "If you do not speak in the House. And it is unfortunate that Prime Minister Modi and Shah did not come to the House and did not tell the reasons. However, they spoke in Varanasi, in Ahmedabad and on television but not in the House. This is the disrespect they did with the House," he said.

Taking a swipe at the Prime Minister, the Congress leader said, "The Prime Minister is speaking everywhere including Varanasi but not in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha on (Parliament security breach incident). We condemn it. This is also a (breach of) privilege case due to the violation of rules," he said.

He also said that the ruling party people are disturbing the Parliament proceedings but no action is being taken on them.

"Yesterday, it was the first time that the Parliamentary Affairs minister along with 120 MPs was standing in Rajya Sabha and the MPs were shouting slogans. This shows they don't have faith in democracy," Kharge added.

On Wednesday, two more MPs were suspended for the remainder of Winter Session, taking the total number of suspended MPs to 143.

On Tuesday, 49 Lok Sabha MPs were suspended.

The Lok Sabha suspended 33 MPs and 45 Rajya Sabha MPs were suspended on Monday. On December 14, a total of 13 Lok Sabha MPs and one Rajya Sabha MP was suspended for the remainder of winter session over their demands of a detailed discussion on December 13 Parliament security breach.

On December 13, coinciding with the 22nd anniversary of the 2001 Parliament terror attack, two people jumped from visitors gallery into the Lok Sabha Chamber during the Zero hour proceedings and also sprayed yellow colour smoke.

The two people were caught from inside the Parliament while two were caught from outside. Two more were arrested by Delhi Police Special Cell later.

The opposition bloc has also planned to stage a nationwide protest on December 22. The opposition MPs have planned a protest at Jantar Mantar and a march towards Parliament on December 22 against the suspension of 143 MPs.