4 in recent Session, 2 over 2 days: A look at suspension of MPs in current Parliament, since 2019

On Thursday, the Lok Sabha had suspended Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, the leader of the Congress in the House, for “repeated misconduct”, pending an investigation by the Privileges Committee.

Soon after Prime Minister Narendra Modi had finished his speech in the no-confidence motion debate, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pralhad Joshi moved a resolution for Chowdhury’s suspension – with no one present in the Opposition Benches – accusing him of “disturbing” the House. The resolution was passed by a voice vote.

On August 8, Trinamool Congress (TMC) Rajya Sabha MP Derek O’Brien almost got suspended after getting into a heated argument with Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar. While Goyal moved a motion in this regard against O’Brien “for continuously and wilfully disturbing the proceedings… for disobeying the Chair”, the motion was finally not put to vote.

On August 3, the AAP’s lone Lok Sabha MP, Sushil Kumar Rinku, was suspended “for the remaining part of the Monsoon Session” over “unruly behaviour” while the House was considering the Delhi services Bill. Rinku had come to the Well of the House, torn some papers and thrown them in the direction of Speaker Om Birla.

After the Bill was passed, Birla asked Parliamentary Affairs Minister Joshi to move a resolution for Rinku’s suspension.

Earlier, on July 24, the Rajya Sabha saw the suspension of AAP MP Sanjay Singh. This was the onset of the Session and the Opposition members had been raising slogans to demand a statement from the PM on Manipur. At one point, Singh moved closer to the Chairman’s podium, prompting Dhankhar to “name” him.

Goyal then said he would like to move a motion to suspend Singh, saying this “kind of behaviour… is completely against the ethics and rules of the House”. It was then put to vote and passed. On Friday, the period of Singh’s suspension was extended till the Privileges Committee decides on the complaints against him.

A top Congress leader said this kind of suspensions “pending a report of the Privileges Committee” were a new phenomenon, leaving the fate of the MP up in the air.

On Friday, after Parliament was adjourned, Congress deputy leader in the Rajya Sabha Pramod Tiwari said: “Why has Raghav Chadha been suspended? Those members who had objections to their names (being included in the proposed select committee) could have gone to the Chairman (Dhankhar).”

On Sanjay Singh’s suspension, Tiwari said one Session has already passed when he faced the penalty, and the AAP MP continues to be suspended. “They can suspend up to the remainder of a Session only, not beyond it. In between, they can terminate the suspension if they feel so,” Tiwari said.

“This is dictatorship,” AAP Rajya Sabha MP N D Gupta said at a party press conference, adding that Singh had been suspended for “the remainder of the Monsoon Session” under Rule 256, which stipulates that his suspension cannot be extended beyond that Session.

Singh, who was present at the press conference, said he was being “punished twice in one case”, and dubbed the extension of his suspension from the Rajya Sabha as “weird and shocking”.

Shiv Sena MP Priyanka Chaturvedi said: “It is for the first time in the history of parliamentary democracy that a Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha (Chowdhury technically enjoys that position) has been suspended.”

A look at suspensions in the current Parliament, the rules, and the largest such action:

February 2023

During the Budget Session, on February 10, Congress MP Rajani Patil was suspended from the Rajya Sabha for allegedly videographing the proceedings of the House. Dhankhar took the disciplinary action after the BJP complained about a tweeted video showing the Opposition agitation during Modi’s reply on the motion of thanks.

On August 7, the Rajya Sabha revoked the suspension of Patil. BJP MP Saroj Pandey, presenting the report of the Committee of Privileges, said the panel held Patil guilty but considered her suspension till then to be adequate, revoking it with effect from August 7, a day ahead of the no-trust debate.

Monsoon Session, 2022

On July 26, 19 Opposition members pressing for an urgent discussion on price rise and the hike in GST rates were suspended from the Rajya Sabha for a week.

They included Sushmita Dev, Mausam Noor, Shanta Chhetri, Dola Sen, Santanu Sen, Abhi Ranjan Biswar and Md. Nadimul Haque (all 7 from the TMC); M Hamamed Abdulla, S Kalyanasundaram, R Girranjan, N R Elango, M Shanmugam and Kanimozhi (all 6 from the DMK); B Lingaiah Yadav, Ravichandra Vaddiraju, Damodar Rao Divakonda (all 3 from the TRS); A A Rahim and V Sivadasan (both from the CPI-M); and Santhosh Kumar P from the CPI.

A day prior to it, four Congress Lok Sabha MPs – Manickam Tagore, Ramya Haridas, T N Prathapan and S Jothimani – were named by the Chair, under Rule 374 of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in Parliament, for displaying placards in the House and were suspended for the remainder of that Session.

Winter Session, 2021

On November 29, 12 Opposition members were suspended from the Rajya Sabha on the very first day of the Session for “unprecedented acts of misconduct, contemptuous, unruly and violent behaviour and intentional attacks on security personnel”.

This was after they were suspended for their alleged misconduct towards the end of the Monsoon Session in August that year, when marshals were called after the Opposition MPs stormed the Well.

Parliament Sessions at the time were continuously disrupted over the Centre’s three farm laws, which had seen widespread farmer protests and were later withdrawn by the government.

The suspended members comprised six MPs from the Congress (Phulo Devi Netam, Chhaya Verma, Ripun Bora, Rajamani Patel, Syed Nasir Hussain and Akhilesh Prasad Singh); 2 from the TMC (Dola Sen, Shanta Chhetri); 2 from the united Shiv Sena (Priyanka Chaturvedi, Anil Desai); Elamaram Kareem of the CPI(M); and Binoy Viswam of the CPI.

Monsoon Session, 2020

On September 21, eight Rajya Sabha MPs were suspended for alleged unruly behaviour in the House the previous day (September 20). The motion was passed by a voice vote.

The government had moved a motion seeking the suspension of Derek O’Brien (TMC), Sanjay Singh (AAP), Rajeev Satav (Congress), K K Ragesh (CPI-M), Syed Nazir Hussain (Congress), Ripun Boren (Congress), Dola Sen (TMC) and Elamaram Kareem (CPI-M).

After the motion was adopted, the then Chairman, M Venkaiah Naidu, asked the MPs to leave the House. The suspended members initially refused to leave, and then sat on a dharna outside Parliament. The Opposition parties sharply criticised their suspension.

Budget Session, 2020

On March 5, the Lok Sabha suspended seven Congress MPs – Gaurav Gogoi, T N Prathapan, Dean Kuriakose, R Unnithan, Manickam Tagore, Benny Behanan and Gurjeet Singh Aujla – for “gross misconduct” after they trooped into the Well and snatched papers from the Speaker’s table.

The Congress members were protesting against a Rajasthan BJP MP who called for a probe on whether coronavirus was being spread from the “home” of then Congress president Sonia Gandhi, after a surge in cases of the virus reported from Italy.

Winter Session, 2019

On November 11, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla suspended Congress MPs, Hibi Eden and T N Prathapan, for storming the well of the House and obstructing the proceedings by shouting slogans to protest against the swearing-in of a BJP-led government in Maharashtra in the wee hours, with Devendra Fadnavis as the Chief Minister and NCP leader Ajit Pawar as the Deputy CM.

The Congress leaders were carrying placards with messages like “save Constitution” and “save democracy” and a black banner reading “stop murder of democracy”, and jostled with the marshals.

Powers of presiding officers

MPs are required to adhere to certain rules of parliamentary etiquette, such as not interrupting the speech of others, maintaining silence, and since 1989, not shouting slogans, displaying placards or tearing up documents in protest.

The presiding officer of a House can direct an MP to leave for grossly disorderly conduct. The MP then has to remain absent from the proceedings of the House for the remainder of the day. The presiding officers can also “name” an MP for “persistently and wilfully obstructing the business” of the House. In such a case, usually, the Parliamentary Affairs Minister moves a motion for suspending the offending MP from the service of the House. The suspension can last until the end of the Session.

In 2001, the Lok Sabha rule was amended to give the Speaker one additional power. A new rule, 374A, empowers the Speaker to automatically suspend an MP for a maximum of five days for disrupting the business of the House. In 2015, Speaker Sumitra Mahajan used this rule for suspending 25 Congress MPs.

Largest suspension of MPs from Parliament

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In 1989, while Rajiv Gandhi headed a brute majority Congress government, 63 MPs were suspended for a week following commotion over the tabling of the Thakkar Commission report, that looked into the 1984 assassination of Indira Gandhi. Four more MPs joined them in walking out of the House.