Zeenews Bureau
New Delhi: Lok Sabha on Tuesday condemned
Team Anna for "lowering the dignity" of Parliament after a
resolution was moved over which members cutting across party
line slammed the activists for using derogatory language
against MPs.
"Any remark lowering the dignity and esteem of this august
House is unwarranted and totally unacceptable," Speaker Meira
Kumar said summing up the sense of the House, after a brief
discussion.
She said members of the House undergo rigorous scrutiny by
the Election Commission under the provisions of Representation
of People Act, Model Code of Conduct and other legal
requirements while filing their nomination for election.
"After meticulously assessing their conduct and
performance, the people of India, in their wisdom, elect them.
The Parliament, therefore, reflects the collective will of the
people of our country," the Speaker said.
Led by JD-U leader Sharad Yadav, members from all
political hues came together in Lok Sabha to attack Team Anna
for using derogatory language against parliamentarians. Some
of them even said that those who levelled attack against the
temple of democracy should be summoned in the House to punish
them.
Moving a resolution against the civil society members,
Yadav said the Speaker should take suo motu action against
them for their utterances against democratic institutions.
Describing Parliament as a "supreme institution", SP
leader Mulayam Singh Yadav said those civil society members
who challenged its authority should be "summoned and taken to
task". He requested consensus among members on the issue.
Speaking in the Lok Sabha today JD(U) president Sharad Yadav said that, “ People have seen what has been happening and what Team Anna has been speaking. I am worried that if the Parliament is not respected then where will the country go?
“A trend has started in the country to denigrate the politicians. Yes, the public has a right to be angry at us. But there should be a limit to it,” he added.
Directly attacking Team Anna, the JD(U) said that a kind of pessimism is being spread in the country in the wrong manner. Nonetheless, he accepted that fight against corruption should go on but in the right manner.
He also accepted that no everyone is of high morals in the Parliament. “There have been people in this House who have not been deserving of the place.” “But to disrespect the temple of democracy is not the right thing to do,” Sharad Yadav added.
“I do not object to the attack by Team Anna at us but no one should attack the institution of democracy,” he told the House.
The alleged inflammatory remarks made by Team Anna led to a huge uproar in both the Houses of Parliament on Monday and finally led to their adjournment.
Reacting to these allegations, Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj had said, “Team Anna has lost its focus, crossed all limits."
Swaraj, whose party had supported Anna Hazare`s call for the Lokpal Bill, even advised Team Anna to maintain its integrity.
Congress MP Sanjay Nirupam had also endorsed the views expressed by Swaraj and Yadav and said, “Team Anna members call themselves the representatives of civil society but they have themselves used unparliamentary language. They have conducted themselves in a highly irresponsible and uncivilized manner."
Team Anna landed in a fresh controversy after key team members including Arvind Kejriwal, Kiran Bedi and others made derogatory remarks against the Parliamentarians during Anna Hazare’s day-long fast at New Delhi’s Jantar Mantar on Sunday.
Anna Hazare, while addressing his supporters, also warned that the government should be prepared to be voted out of power in 2014 if it does not pass the Lokpal Bill, which provides for a national anti-corruption agency.
With PTI inputs
