A day before the beginning of the Budget session, the government on Tuesday said that the suspension of all Members of Parliament will be revoked. This includes those whose matter is before the Privilege Committee.

“All suspensions will be revoked. I have spoken with the Lok Sabha Speaker and Rajya Sabha Chairman, and I have also requested them on behalf of the government,” Pralhad Joshi told the reporters after the customary all-party meeting on the eve of the session. The session, the last one for the 17th Lok Sabha, is beginning on Wednesday and is scheduled to end on February 9.

On December 14, 14 MPs (13 from Lok Sabha and one from Rajya Sabha) from the opposition bench were suspended for ‘unruly conduct’ after they chanted slogans demanding a statement from Home Minister Amit Shah regarding the security breach incident. Joshi said the MPs were suspended for violating a new Parliament rule that disallows placards. On December 18, another 78 MPs (33 from the Lok Sabha and 45 from the Rajya Sabha) were suspended, while on December 19, another 49 were suspended.

On December 20, two more Lok Sabha MPs were suspended and a day later another three MPs were suspended before Parliament adjourned sine die, a day ahead of schedule. A total of 146 MPs (100 from Lok Sabha and 46 from Rajya Sabha) were suspended from Parliament during the session. While most of them were suspended for the session only, matters related to some were sent to the Privilege Committee.

“This is the jurisdiction of the Speaker and the Chairman. So, we have requested both of them to speak with the concerned privileged committees, revoke the suspension, and give them the opportunity to come to the House. Both of them agreed,” he added while clarifying that all the suspended MPs will come to the House from Wednesday.

Meanwhile, the government told floor leaders of various parties that it was ready to discuss every issue in the upcoming Budget session of Parliament. Defence Minister and Deputy Leader in the Lok Sabha, Rajnath Singh, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Joshi and his deputy Arjun Ram Meghwal represented the government at the meet. Congress’ K Suresh, TMC’s Sudip Bandopadhyay, DMK’s T R Baalu, Shiv Sena’s Rahul Shewale, Samajwadi Party’s S T Hasan, JD(U)‘s Ram Nath Thakur, and TDP’s Jayadev Galla were among the leaders present at the meeting at the Parliament House complex.

Congress MP Pramod Tiwari, who represented the Leader of the Opposition in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge, said he raised the issue of the “violent attack” on the Bharat Jodo Yatra led by Rahul Gandhi in Assam and the State government’s curbs on it. An “unwritten dictatorship” prevails in the country, he said and accused the Central government of misusing probe agencies such as the CBI and the ED to target opposition leaders such as Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren and RJD supremo Lalu Prasad.

The session will begin with President Droupadi Murmu’s address to a joint sitting of both Houses. It will be a short session this time, between January 31 and February 9, with Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman set to table an interim budget ahead of the Lok Sabha.

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