NEW DELHI: The opposition MPs, who were suspended on Friday after chaos during a JPC meeting on Waqf (Amendment) Bill 2024, wrote to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla claiming they were suspended after the panel chairman “spoke to somebody on the phone”.
In a letter addressed to the Speaker, opposition MPs recounted the sequence of events, raising concerns about the alleged unilateral and unfair handling of committee proceedings by the chairman. The MPs alleged that their repeated requests to reschedule the JPC meeting were ignored, causing them to rush back to Delhi on short notice, compromising their scheduled constituency programs.
“When the meeting started today at 11.00 AM, we the members of opposition vehemently raised our voice with utmost respect against the way of conducting the business by the chairman. We highlighted the unilateral as well as unfair manner of functioning of JPC by ignoring the due process contemplated in the rules,” the letter stated.
“It is respectfully submitted that since the erstwhile served notice scheduled for the meeting on 24th and 25th, we the members designed our programmes in the constituency/states from 27 to 30th as the Parliament Session starts on 31st and thereby prayed for postponement of the 27th meeting. While we put forth these reasonable claims in civilised manner to the chairman, he has not even attempted to respond,” the MPs wrote.
“As we all felt humiliated, we stood and raise our voice democratically to hear our demands. Meanwhile, the chairman spoke in phone with somebody and suddenly and surprisingly, he ordered our suspension with shouting,” they claimed.
“It is our opinion that the chairman of a JPC does not have the power to suspend the members of the committee. It is therefore prayed that the chairman of the JPC may kindly be instructed to conduct the proceedings in a transparent and fair manner,” the suspended MPs wrote to the Speaker.
The suspended MPs include Kalyan Banerjee, Md. Jawaid, A Raja, Asaduddin Owaisi, Nasir Hussain, Mohibullah, M Abdullah, Arvind Sawant, Nadimul Haq, and Imran Masood.
Meanwhile, BJP MP and JPC member Nishikant Dubey accused the opposition of creating a ruckus and acting against parliamentary democracy. “The opposition, especially Owaisi ji, believed that Jammu and Kashmir’s full representation was not heard, and elected representatives should have been called. Today’s meeting, which was scheduled to discuss… was postponed by the chairman based on the opposition’s suggestion,” Dubey said.
“However, in front of Mirwaiz, these people created a ruckus, misbehaved, and acted against parliamentary democracy,” he added.
This is not the first time that a JPC meeting on the Waqf Amendment Bill 2024 was concluded in a ruckus. Earlier in October, a scuffle broke out between Kalyan Banerjee and BJP’s Abhijit Gangopadhyay during the Joint Parliamentary Committee meeting on the Waqf Bill. Banerjee smashed a glass bottle and hurled it towards the committee’s chairperson, BJP MP Jagdambika Pal, injuring himself in the process.