Kumar Bahukhandi
Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge -Photo Credit-PTI
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar will participate in the debate in the upper house
New Delhi: Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge will open the debate for the party on Operation Sindoor in the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday. Congress has been allotted approximately two hours out of the total 16 hours allocated for the discussion. The debate is scheduled to take place a day after the discussion in the Lok Sabha.
According to sources, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar will participate in the debate in the upper house. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is also expected to intervene in the discussion.
Meanwhile, proceedings of both houses of Parliament were adjourned until noon today, shortly after they convened amid ruckus over demands for discussions on various issues, including Operation Sindoor and the voter list revision exercise in Bihar.
Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla adjourned the lower house amid sloganeering by the opposition, with several MPs holding banners and protesting in the well of the house. Before adjourning during Question Hour, Birla remarked that opposition members were deliberately disrupting proceedings.
He urged Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi to ask his party members not to display posters, stating that such actions lower the dignity of the house. “Members are not being allowed to speak during Question Hour, and the people of the country are watching,” Birla said, accusing the opposition of deliberate obstruction.
“Respected members, do you want to obstruct the house? Do you not want to discuss Operation Sindoor? Both Gogoi and members of the government came for an all-party meeting and agreed on the discussion. Now you are interrupting the house. Question Hour is the most important time for members,” he said before adjourning the session.
The Rajya Sabha was also adjourned until noon amid uproar after Deputy Chairperson Harivansh Narayan Singh rejected notices seeking a debate on the closure of government schools in Uttar Pradesh.
Ahead of the 16-hour-long discussion in the Lok Sabha on Operation Sindoor, Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju appealed to the opposition to refrain from making statements that echo Pakistan’s narrative.
“I request the opposition, especially the Congress, not to do anything to harm India’s interests and not speak Pakistan’s language. We must maintain the dignity of the Indian armed forces,” Rijiju told ANI.
Twenty-six civilians were killed in the April 22 terror attack in Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir. India responded with precision strikes under Operation Sindoor, targeting terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK).
( Source : ANI )
