Thin attendance in Parliament

NEW DELHI: Sonia Gandhi may have been repeatedly asking her MPs that “regular attendance is part of the the basic duty and responsibility”, but that it yet to register with her parliamentary group.

For almost an hour, the treasury benches wore a deserted look even when the item that was being discussed was the general budget. The Opposition made an issue of the absence of Congress members during the debate saying that it displayed the government’s “casual approach” to Parliament. Former finance minister Yashwant Sinha raised the issue, followed by Sushma Swaraj.

“A serious discussion on the Budget is on but there are hardly any members in the treasury benches. This show how serious they are on this issue,” Ms Swaraj remarked amid cries of “shame, shame” from the Opposition benches.

Minister of state for parliamentary affairs V Narayanasamy said parliamentary affairs minister PK Bansal would be back in the House within a few minutes. Mr Bansal was soon back in the House and another Cabinet Minister Vayalar Ravi also rushed in.