My heart bleeds over what is happening in the House: PM

After several members of his Council of Ministers took part in the noisy anti-Telangana protests during presentation of the interim rail budget in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said his heart bled over such disruptions in parliamentary proceedings.

But Union Minister for Human Resource Development M Pallam Raju said that the prime minister’s comment was not fair as the current Lok Sabha had witnessed disruptions on other issues in the past.

“My heart bleeds to see what is happening in the House,” Prime Minister told journalists soon after noisy protests against the move to create Telangana from Andhra Pradesh marred the presentation of the budget in the Lok Sabha.

Railway Minister Mallikarjun Kharge had to cut short his speech due to ruckus created by MPs who are against creation of Telangana.

“It is sad for democracy that such things are happening even after all appeals for calm,” said the Prime Minister.

Union ministers K S Rao, K Chiranjeevi, D Purandeshwari and K Suryaprakash Reddy also marched into the well of the House to join the MPs protesting against Telangana. Raju and another minister Kruparani Killi too rose from their seats as mark of solidarity with the protesting MPs, although they did not go to the well of the House.

“I do not think the comment is fair just to isolate what is happening today. It has been happening in the House. Certainly, I think there has been a failing somewhere,” said Raju, reacting to the prime minister’s comment. “It is not just today. It happened in the 15th Lok Sabha and it has happened on multiple issues,” he added.

The HRD minister said that the move for bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh was “absolute injustice” and it should not succeed. He justified the uproar created by the anti-Telangana Congress MPs and ministers, saying that it was expected that they would put up a “final battle” in the House against the proposed division of Andhra Pradesh.

Raju said that some issues had not been dealt with in a proper manner. “And, therefore that public pressure translates on to the elected representatives and it is expected of us to put up a final battle in the House,” said the minister, who himself is elected from Seemandhra region of Andhra Pradesh and is known to be opposed to the move to create Telangana. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kamal Nath also express dismay at the way the business of the House was conducted.

“It is very unfortunate. The obstruction and creating disturbances and all kinds of unruly scenes are creating very bad precedents,” Nath told journalists.