Monsoon Session: Rajya Sabha adjourned twice after uproar

SP members stalled proceedings demanding special status to Uttar Pradesh.

Rajya Sabha was on Monday adjourned twice during Question Hour as SP members stalled proceedings demanding special status to Uttar Pradesh while Left parties raised the issue of rising onion prices.

After Chairman Hamid Ansari made obituary references to passing away of former members Dilip Singh Judev and S M Laljan Basha and mourned the death of Navy personnel in a submarine accident,members of BJP,SP and Left parties sprang to their feet.

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Ansari asked members to speak one by one and allowed M Venkaiah Naidu (BJP) to make his submission.

Naidu said files pertaining to coal block allocation have gone missing and it was a serious issue. Ansari then asked him to raise the issue during Zero Hour.

As BJP members took their seats,SP members stood up demanding special status and an economic package for Uttar Pradesh. Samajwadi Party is the ruling party in UP.

“Uttar Pradesh ko vishesh rajya ka darja do (give special status to Uttar Pradesh),” they shouted.

Left MPs too were up on their feet carrying banners seeking check on spiralling onion prices.

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Ansari asked members to resume their places so that Question Hour could be taken up. He asked them not to show posters.

As his request went unheeded,Ansari adjourned the House for 15 minutes.

When the House reassembled,SP members were again on their feet demanding special status for Uttar Pradesh.

Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Rajeev Shukla tried to calm the agitating members saying a committee constituted by the government to decide on criteria for

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special status to states is yet to submit its report.

He said any decision would be taken only after the committee submits its report.

SP members,however,kept raising slogans,forcing Ansari to adjourn the House till noon.

Earlier,the House mourned the death of Navy personnel in a fire and explosion in a submarine at Mumbai Naval Dockyard.

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Ansari said 18 Navy personnel – 3 officers and 15 sailors – were inside the submarine at the time of incident.

He said though only four bodies had been found,survival of personnel on board was uncertain given the magnitude of the accident.

“The loss of precious lives is indeed tragic and sad,” he said after which members stood in silence to mourn the dead.

The House also mourned the death of former members Dilip Singh Judev and S M Laljan Basha.

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Judev,who represented Madhya Pradesh in the Upper House from June 1992 to November 2000 and Chhattisgarh from November 2000 to May 2009,died on August 14 at the age of 64.

Basha,who represented Andhra Pradesh in Rajya Sabha from April 2000 to April 2008,passed way on August 15 at the age of 57.

The House observed silence as a mark of respect to the memory of the departed.