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With rabble rousers suspended from LS, Congress hopes to get Food Bill passed

In a last ditch effort to get the Food Security Bill passed in the Monsoon session, the Government on Friday finally got Lok Sabha speaker Meira Kumar to suspended 12 MPs from Andhra Pradesh for continuously disrupting the House on the Telangana issue.

In the Lok Sabha, the speaker named eight members from Congress and four from Telugu Desam Party (TDP) for ‘grave disorder’ after two brief adjournments of the House due to disruptions by their continued protests. All of them belong to Andhra and Rayalaseema regions. The action came a day after the government’s effort to bring a motion for suspension of 10 members of the two parties was scuttled by a united opposition.

The action was taken under rule Rule 374(A) of Rules of Procedure of the Lok Sabha. As per the rule, a member after being named by the Speaker stands ‘automatically suspended from the service of the House for five consecutive sittings or the remainder of the session, whichever is less’. The rule, which was used for the first time since its introduction in the last Lok Sabha, also states, ‘Provided that the House may, at any time, on a motion being made, resolve that such suspension be terminated.’

The Lok Sabha speaker took the decision to suspend the MPs at an all-party meeting held on Friday morning to end the stalemate in the wake of Thursday’s failed attempt to adopt a suspension motion against the erring members. At the meeting, JD (U) leader Sharad Yadav is said to have suggested that the Speaker should take a final call on the issue, which was accepted by all parties.

It was decided that Kumar will suspend the members herself instead of the government moving a resolution for it. Before the all-party meeting in the Speaker’s Chamber, prime minister Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi discussed Parliament’s functioning, which was also attended by senior ministers Sushilkumar Shinde and P Chidambaram were also present.

Now with MPs suspended the Lok Sabha will discuss the Food Security Bill on Monday. ‘The House will function on Saturday. But a large of members and leaders have expressed that they are going to be away... Many members and leaders want to speak on the Food Security Bill, so they have requested to the Speaker that the Food Security Bill should not be taken up on Saturday, but on Monday,’ said parliamentary affairs minister Kamal Nath. 
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