Trinamool Congress leader in Rajya Sabha Derek O'Brien has been suspended for the remaining part of the Winter Session for hurling the rule book in the House.
Taking to the microblogging site Twitter, O'Brien wrote, "The last time I got suspended from RS was when govt was bulldozing farm laws. We all know what happened after that. Today, suspended while protesting against the BJP making a mockery of Parliament and Bulldozing Elections Laws Bill 2021."
According to reports, O'Brien threw the rulebook at the Chair while staging a protest and walkout at the Rajya Sabha amid discussions regarding the new amendments to the Election Bill and the suspension of 12 MPs earlier in the month.
Election Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2021, introduced by Minister of Law and Justice Kiren Rijiju, was passed in Lok Sabha through voice vote on Monday and will most likely pass in the Rajya Sabha today. The Bill seeks to amend the Representation of People's Act, 1950 and asks to link Aadhaar with the Elector's Photo Identity Card (EPIC), a move that has met criticism throughout the opposition political spectrum, civil societies and NGOs.
Why has the move to amend the election laws evoked anger?
Election Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2021, introduced by Minister of Law and Justice Kiren Rijiju, was passed in Lok Sabha through voice vote on Monday and will most likely pass in the Rajya Sabha today. The Bill seeks to amend the Representation of People's Act, 1950 and asks to link Aadhaar with the Elector's Photo Identity Card (EPIC), a move that has met criticism throughout the opposition political spectrum, civil societies and NGOs.
The Election Commission has claimed the new amendments will help clean up voter rolls, and that any linkage will be 'voluntary'. However, it's being widely claimed that the move will lead to mass disenfranchisement and large-scale voter fraud. It is also being said that this will impede the citizens' right to privacy by enabling voter profiling through the linkage of data sets that Aadhaar enables to provide.
Suspension of 12 MPs
12 Rajya Sabha MPs were suspended by the Rajya Sabha at the start of the Winter Session in Parliament earlier in December, allegedly for causing ruckus in the House. These include Shiv Sena MP Priyanka Chaturvedi and Trinamool MP Dona Sen among others. Other TMC and Sena as well as several Congress MP’s were suspended.
The suspension has caused protests across parties. Opposition parties on Tuesday had also decided to take out a protest march in support of their demand for revoking the suspension.
(With PTI inputs)
