Cong MPs won’t take daily House allowance
With Parliament disrupted for the second week, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi are among 80 party MPs who have decided not to take their daily allowance. The Congress MPs have written to Speaker Meira Kumar that the principle of “no work, no pay” should be followed for the days Parliament did not function.
Parliamentary affairs minister P.K. Bansal stated that almost 80 MPs have voluntarily written to Speaker Meira Kumar asking her to not pay them the daily allowances on days Parliament did not function.
The move by Congress leaders comes in the wake of both Houses not functioning for 11 consecutive working days due to the ongoing 2G spectrum allocation controversy.
“Several Congress MPs have told me that they did not want the daily allowance of Rs. 2,000 since Parliament was getting adjourned without transacting any business,” Mr Bansal stated. The parliamentary affairs minister said that the Congress president “supports and favours” their decision.
“Though this is an individual decision, Congress MPs have decided that they will not take their daily allowance from November 10 till the end of this session. We should follow the principle of no work, no pay,” Mr Bansal said.
Each MP gets Rs. 2,000 per day when Parliament is on. The Congress has 207 MPs in the 545-member Lok Sabha and 71 in the 245-member Rajya Sabha.
Mr Bansal stated that he personally felt the allowances given to MPs should be stopped for days on which Parliament did not function.
Mr Bansal claimed that some opposition MPs had insisted on coming to Parliament and staging a protest is also part of their work.
He rubbished charges from some of the opposition parties that not taking allowances was merely “trivialising” the issue.
Post new comment