Sonia Gandhi leads Opposition to force adjournment in Lok Sabha over fuel price hike

Congress chief engages with other Opposition members asking them to refrain from participating in Question Hour.

Congress president Sonia Gandhi speaks in the Lok Sabha on March 23, 2022. Photo: SANSAD TV via PTI

Opposition members, led by Congress president Sonia Gandhi, forced a 20-minute adjournment in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday to register their protest against the rise in the prices of petrol, diesel and LPG.

Ms. Gandhi not only marshalled her party colleagues but was also proactively engaged with other Opposition members, asking them to refrain from participating in the Question Hour. She was seen giving instructions to leader of the Congress in the Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and other party members who were protesting in the well of the House.

Pralhad Joshi’s comment

The Congress members were louder compared to the members of other Opposition parties while protesting in the well of the House, prompting Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pralhad Joshi to comment that the Congress had not learnt its lessons despite voters decisively rejecting it in the recent Assembly elections.

When National Conference (NC) member Hasnain Masoodi stood up to ask a supplementary question to the question listed against his name, Ms. Gandhi was seen instructing him to sit down and he obliged.

Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal responded by stating the Congress was preventing the representative of the people of Jammu and Kashmir his rights to ask about his people.

When the Speaker announced the name of Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) member ET Mohammed Basheer to ask his question, Ms. Gandhi ensured that he raised the issue of petroleum prices.

Seek rollback

Earlier in the day, Congress members of both the Houses protested against the hike in petroleum products’ prices in front of the Mahatma Gandhi statue inside the Parliament complex and demanded a rollback.

“The government may resort to some kind of hyperbolic lame excuse that due to Ukraine-Russia war situation, this kind of price hike was necessity. It is far from the truth as only 0.2 per cent of India’s petroleum imports are from the war-affected areas,” Mr. Chowdhury told reporters after the protest. The latest hike would further trigger inflation, he added.