Rajya Sabha bids farewell to 54 retiring members

NEW DELHI: Rajya Sabha today bid farewell to 54 retiring members as the outgoing MPs shared their experiences and nostalgic moments.

"...today, we bid farewell to some of our colleagues, who are retiring in the months of April and May this year on completion of their term of office," Rajya Sabha Chairman Hamid Ansari said.

54 members from Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal will be completing their term of office.

15 of the retiring members have been re-elected. "I am happy to note that some of the members have been re-elected, but the House will certainly miss those who would not be coming back," Ansari said.

Leader of the Opposition Arun Jaitley said some of the members will not be coming back to the House and hoped they will continue to contribute through their public lives.

The senior BJP leader recalled that there may be political differences, but members were rarely seen clashing at individual level.

Sitaram Yechury (CPI-M) said irrespective of political differences, the members have tried best to maintain dignity of the Upper House.

He said many of the retiring members would enter Lok Sabha after the general elections.

N K Singh (JD-U), who would be retiring, said Bihar has shown improvement on several fronts in the past few years and it was not because of only one party or one person.

It was contribution of "collective leadership" of JD-U and BJP.

Recalling his earlier days in the House, he said once he misquoted someone and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh assumed the role of teacher to correct him.

Another retiring member Bharatkumar Raut (SS) said he considers the House as his university as he learnt how to be a human being.

He also urged the Chair to provide more time to regional parties to express their view points.

Renu Bala (BJD), Barun Mukherji (AIFB) and A A Jinnah (DMK), who too would be retiring, expressed their views.

Earlier, in his farewell speech, Naresh Agrawal (SP) said in politics nothing is permanent and hoped the outgoing members would keep serving the country at other fora.

V Maitreyan (AIADMK), T M Selvaganapathi (DMK), Ali Anwar Ansari (JD-U), Shashi Bhusan Behera (BJD), Y S Chowdary (TDP) and Balwinder Singh Bhunder(SAD) also spoke.

D Raja (CPI) said many valuable members are retiring. He said there are other fora where they should continue their services to people and country.