NEW DELHI: Before the day began, Mahua Moitra told in Hindi that Durga had arrived. “We shall see now. When destruction comes, it is conscience that dies first. They started with disrobing, now you watch the battle of the Mahabharat,” she said.
“I am 49 years old. I will fight you for the next 30 years, inside parliament, outside parliament, in the gutters, you on the streets. I will see the end of you, do not wonder,” she said, in the presence of senior parliamentarians like Sonia Gandhi, Farooq Abdullah, and her own party MPs standing behind her. The last word, however, went to Moitra who outside the House said, “This is the beginning of the end. Jab naash manush par chaata hai toh pehle vivek mar jaata hai (When the end is near, man loses his morality first)”.
Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra was expelled from the Lok Sabha today, (December 8), after the Ethics Committee of the Lok Sabha tabled its report recommending as much over allegations she took money to ask questions in parliament. Speaker Om Birla did not allow Moitra to speak.
TMC leader Mahua Moitra has been expelled from the Lok Sabha following an Ethics Committee report into the ‘cash for query’ charges against her. Ms Moitra, 49, was accused of taking bribes, including ₹ 2 crore in cash and “luxury gift items”, from businessman Darshan Hiranandani, in exchange for asking questions critical of the government in Parliament.
Ms Moitra was also accused of surrendering log-in credentials to her personal and confidential account on the parliamentary website, so Mr Hiranandani could post questions directly. A fiery critic of the Modi government, Ms Moitra had denied the bribery charges but admitted to sharing the log-in details.
After a tempestuous discussion and voice vote, Mr Birla said, “This House accepts the conclusions of the Committee – that MP Mahua Moitra’s conduct was immoral and indecent. So, it is not appropriate for her to continue as an MP.
Meanwhile,West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who is also Ms Moitra’s party boss, called the expulsion “unacceptable” and said that “vendetta politics of (the) BJP had killed democracy”.”Mahua will win the battle…. people will give justice. They (BJP) will be defeated in the next election,” Ms Banerjee said, drawing battle-lines (if more were needed) before next year’s general election.
Hours earlier the Ethics Committee presented its report – a nearly 500-page tome – in the House, triggering a furious row between the ruling BJP and the opposition, including Ms Moitra’s party. In the brief discussion that followed, apoplectic opposition MPs demanded more time to study the material, and fought for Ms Moitra to be allowed to speak.However, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla refused permission, citing the 2005 expulsion of 10 MPs, including six from the BJP, caught in a similar controversy.
Opposition MPs questioned the ethics committee for not cross examining Darshan Hiranandani and also on how parliamentarians were essentially pronouncing judgement against a fellow parliamentarian.
Stepping out of parliament, Moitra said this was a kangaroo court. “Since I was not allowed to speak inside parliament, I am taking this opportunity to speak outside it. I thank my INDIA alliance colleagues…as the hearing of the ethics committee demonstrates, all of us MPs are conveyor belts to get questions from the people to the parliament. If the Modi government hopes that by shutting me up it can forget the Adani issue, then it is mistaken.”
Mahua Moitra was accompanied by top Congress, Bahujan Samaj Party and TMC leaders, including Sonia Gandhi, Danish Ali and others.
“I don’t understand how the Lok Sabha members will go through the 495 pages of the report] within half an hour and how all the speakers will take a decision. I congratulate the INDIA alliance for being united, and we will fight back. In this case, Mahua is a victim of the circumstances. I strongly condemn this and the party completely stands with Mahua,” TMC chief Mamata Banerjee said, according to the news agency PTI.
The report lead to stormy scenes and the adjournment of the house till 2 pm. When the house reconvened, Speaker Birla allowed a 30-minute discussion  on the report tabled barely two hours ago. The controversial report had earlier been listed to have been tabled in the Lower House for December 4 but it was not tabled on that day.
According to PTIthat once the report was tabled TMC and Congress parliament members trooped in the Well, demanding a copy of the report. TMC MP Kalyan Banerjee asked for a discussion before a vote on Moitra’s expulsion. On the chair then was BJP MP Rajendra Agrawal who adjourned proceedings.
After the adjournment, Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury wrote to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla, saying that people were not being given enough time to read the  report, and that they need at least 3-4 days to do so properly. Chowdhury requested as much during the discussion in the Lok Sabha, too. Congress MP Manish Tiwari, focusing on how a panel can at best recommend but not adjudge, said, “Today we are sitting as a court to judge our colleague, this is not a parliament. To this Speaker Birla said, “This is a parliament, there is no judge.”TMC chief whip Kalyan Banerjee, said, “Person against whom a charge has been brought should be allowed to speak,” requesting again and again that Moitra be allowed to speak.
“We witnessed a complete destruction of parliamentary procedure…just so that the rule party could make a point of vendetta against a very vocal MP of the INDIA alliance. By procedure, the ethics panel does not have the power to expel anyone. Second thing, in everything they’ve talked about, there’s no cash link, no money trail, there’s absolutely nothing. Her only offence, if we were to listen to what was said in the Lok Sabha, is that she shared her log in credentials with a third person,” TMC Rajya Sabha MP Saket Gokhale told Newstrack24x7.com.

This is not an uncommon practice, he went on to say. “The second thing is, the ethics committee could have chosen to warn, or even suspended for the rest of the session, if they felt this was such a grave offence. But we see that the ethics committee chairman has been talking publicly, releasing the report of the ethics committee to the media…parliamentary ethics says until a committee report is tabled in the house, it is a confidential document.
As The committee, headed by BJP MP Vinod Kumar Sonkar, has been criticised because of the manner in which its meetings were conducted as well. One such meeting ended in a walkout not just by Moitra but also by five members of the opposition parties. “She was asked which hotel in Dubai she had stayed during her visits and with whom, etc. Opposition members found those questions posed to a woman member of parliament in an official platform very offensive and walked out of it,” an opposition MP told a news portal.
(Bureau Report with Media Inputs).

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