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Journalism of Courage
The trail of the “wad of currency notes” allegedly recovered from the seat allocated to Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi in the Rajya Sabha remains “under investigation” a week on. Meanwhile, the wait of one lonely pen for its rightful claimant continues at the ‘Table Office’, the section of Parliament where all things lost – and almost all found – land up in the House. Time being an exception.
“Most members are quietly returned their belongings. Currently, there is just that unclaimed pen lying in the Table Office. Everything else has been returned,” a Parliament security staff member says, adding that it has been lying with them since the last Session.
The case of recovered cash, announced by Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar himself in the House and disowned completely by Singhvi, is unusual not just in that aspect.
In the usual course, sources say, when an article is found inside Parliament, it is easily traced back, and the MP concerned “immediately informed”. If the MP is still at Parliament House, it is returned then and there. If not, it makes its way to the Table Office, the administrative wing of Parliament which looks after the running of the House, from where MPs can collect their belongings.
In the old Parliament, such goods also made their way to the Parliament Security Office, a small 10X10 ft space on the first floor.
All such duties are now handled by the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), which took over from the Parliament Security Service in the wake of the December 2023 incident, when three visitors smuggled in smoke canisters into the Lok Sabha and burst them in the House.
Over the years, much stuff has passed through their hands, say security officials of Parliament – most frequently, misplaced wedding cards, invitation cards, letters addressed to ministers, Parliament debate papers, chits on party floor strategy, keys, phones, laptops and jewellery. Finding cash is also common, going up to a few thousand of rupees; “wads of currency”, traced or untraced, a first.
“The protocol is so tight that even a Rs 2 coin left behind on a desk is returned to the rightful owner,” says an official.
Behind several recoveries, lie stories. Older staff from the Parliament Security Services recount how they once found an open laptop in the Rajya Sabha, and realised it belonged to then BJP MP Arun Shourie. The UPA was in power at the time.
“We found he was writing a book. We informed Shourie ji’s PA, who said the member would come the next day to pick it up. But Shourie ji arrived the same night. The staff told him the office was closed, but he requested that it be opened and the laptop be handed over to him as all his data was on it,” an official says.
As per security protocol, officials go through possessions to determine ownership – among other things – unless they are sealed.
Then there are things they are now well acquainted with, given the number of times they have stumbled onto them, such as Samajwadi Party Rajya Sabha MP Jaya Bachchan’s candy box. “She often carries this box that she passes around in the House, sharing candies with other MPs. She has left it behind many times and it has been returned to her the next day,” says an official.
The letters recovered in the House mostly deal with requests regarding transfer and posting of officials, while the chits are the ones parties use to inform MPs of a change in floor strategy in the middle of a sitting. “These days, we find fewer wedding cards as MPs now receive the same in digital form on their phones,” the official says.
The stuff turns up during the “anti-sabotage checks” carried out in the two Houses by Parliament security – earlier this was done twice daily, before the Houses sat and after they adjourned for the day. Since the CISF took over, multiple anti-sabotage checks are common, any time an adjournment happens. As per Dhankhar, the currency on Singhvi’s chair was found during one such sweep of the Rajya Sabha.
There have been instances when MPs have themselves approached the Parliament Security Office or the Table Office searching for something they can’t find.
An official admits it can get awkward “when claims on articles not in our possession are made”. “We have to then go through the entire CCTV footage and conduct a proper investigation. But in most of these cases, members come back to say they were mistaken and they had found the lost item at home.”
The CISF officer says that in case security checks turn up articles that can be traced back to owners, they put tags with the name on them, and hand them to the Table Office. “Phones are easy to return, jewellery takes time. Recently, a member lost her earring. She showed us the identical other earring she had. It was given back to her.”
However, whether traced back or not, the security officials do not remember any instance of announcement being made in the House regarding a discovered article, as done by Dhankhar last Friday.
Of all the stories, one fascinates an old-timer the most – the time they found a mobile phone with a camera. “It belonged to (National Conference president) Farooq Abdullah sahab. Those were the days when incoming calls were also charged and extremely few people had mobile phones, let alone phones with cameras. For most of that day, the staff kept discussing the phone. The next day, it was returned to the MP.”
