DMK protest rocks Parl, Houses adjourned

DMK MPs protested against the proposed delimitation exercise and the National Education Policy (NEP) by raising slogans. This led to repeated adjournments and finally both Houses were adjourned till March 21.

The DMK MPs were seen wearing T-shirts bearing slogans "#FairDelimitation" and "Tamil Nadu will fight and Tamil Nadu will win" in the Houses. Apart from the DMK MPs, a few Tamil Nadu lawmakers of the Congress were also seen wearing similar T-shirts.

Besides the T-shirts, the DMK lawmakers were also wearing scarves with "uncivilised" and "undemocratic" written on them. The "un" part of the words was crossed out.

This alluded to Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan's comments against the Tamil Nadu Government earlier during the session over the NEP controversy in the Lok Sabha, when he had called the state government "uncivilised, undemocratic and dishonest".

After being adjourned twice, when the Lok Sabha reassembled at 2 pm, Krishna Prasad Tenneti, who was in the chair, requested the Opposition members to come back to the House in "proper shape".

"We have a discussion on agriculture. (It is) such an important topic of the country (and) you are not allowing the discussion to take place. I request you to cooperate and let the proceedings go on," he urged the Opposition members.

When they did not comply, Tenneti adjourned the House for the day.

Earlier, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla had objected to the DMK members wearing T-shirts with slogans written on them. Claiming that it was against the rules of procedure of the House, Birla later adjourned the House till 12 pm.

DMK members have been trying to raise the delimitation issue in the Lok Sabha, but the Speaker had rejected their pleas contending that the issue was nowhere on the government radar as the Census of population was yet to be conducted.

The Rajya Sabha was also adjourned for the day as soon as it reconvened at 2 pm over the DMK MPs' protest.

The proceedings of the upper House witnessed three adjournments during the pre-lunch period over the issue.

"The House stands adjourned to meet at 11 am on Friday, 21st March," Deputy Chairman Harivansh informed members, as soon as the House reassembled at 2 pm.

Earlier in the day, soon after laying of papers, RS Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar had adjourned the proceedings for an hour till noon and called a meeting of floor leaders of various parties.

However, the deadlock over the issue continued. When the House reassembled at noon, the Deputy Chairman announced that the proceedings had been adjourned again for another 15 minutes.

At 12.15, he again came and announced that the House stood adjourned till 2 pm.

Later, talking to reporters, Tiruchi Siva, leader of the DMK in the Rajya Sabha, said delimitation would bring down the number of MPs from Tamil Nadu to 31 from the current strength of 39. The number of Lok Sabha MPs from Kerala would go down to 12 from the present 20, he said.

"Tamil Nadu now has a share of 7.18 per cent members in the Lok Sabha and we want its share to remain the same," Siva added.

RJD Rajya Sabha member Manoj Kumar Jha said all INDIA bloc MPs supported the DMK on the issue.