Key Points
Nearly two-thirds of the opposition MPs141 in totalstand suspended from Parliament for the remainder of the Winter Session, which ends on 22 December..
Under the rules of the Lok Sabha, all that this unprecedented move required was an order from the Speaker/Chairman of the House..
That Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla and Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar, themselves elected on a party ticket, could simply suspend two-thirds of the opposition may seem surprising to some..
If opposition members could be suspended by majority votes, the Court observed, the Opposition will not be able to effectively participate in the discussion/debate in the House owing to the constant fear of its members being suspendedThat would not be healthy for the democracy as a whole...
Jaitley, then-Leader of the Opposition in Rajya Sabha, argued that parliamentary obstruction is a legitimate tactic of the Opposition, if parliamentary accountability is subverted and a debate is intended to be used merely to put a lid on parliamentary accountability...
