Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge has accused the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of weaponising the suspension of lawmakers from Parliament as a convenient tool to “undermine democracy, sabotage Parliamentary practices and throttle the Constitution”. He said a letter Rajya Sabha chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar wrote to him last week “unfortunately justifies” the government’s “autocratic and arrogant attitude” towards Parliament.

Kharge urged Dhankhar to examine his concerns objectively and with neutrality. “…privilege motions have also been weaponised to muzzle the voice of the Opposition. This is a deliberate design of the ruling dispensation to undermine Parliament. By suspending MPs [members of Parliament], the government is effectively silencing the voice of the voters of 146 MPs altogether,” Kharge wrote in his reply to Dhankhar’s letter.

Kharge said that he agreed with Dhankhar that they need to move ahead but suggested a discussion in the Chairman’s chambers would be pointless if the government was not keen on running the House. He said he was out of Delhi and it would be his “privilege and duty” to meet Dhankhar as soon as he was back.

Dhankhar wrote to Kharge justifying the suspension of a record 146 MPs for disrupting the functioning of Parliament as “unavoidable”.

Kharge referred to Dhankhar’s description of the disorder in Parliament as deliberate, strategised, and predetermined. He added the mass suspension of the Opposition MPs from both Houses of Parliament seems to be predetermined and premeditated by the government. “I am most sorry to say, executed without any application of mind, as can be seen by the suspension of an INDIA [Opposition India National Developmental Inclusive Alliance] party MP who was not even present in the Parliament,” he said.

Kharge cited notices for a statement from the Union Home minister Amit Shah on the Parliament security breach on December 14 before the suspensions started. He added it is within Dhankhar’s powers to decide on them. “…it was regrettable that the Chair condoned the attitude of the Hon’ble Home Minister and the Government who did not wish to make a statement on the floor of the House,” he wrote. “It was even more regrettable that the Hon’ble Home Minister made his first public statement before a TV channel when Parliament was in session and the Chair did not find that sacrileging the temple of democracy.”

He said a Union minister allegedly informed an Opposition parliamentarian that most opposition MPs will be suspended before the home minister comes to Rajya Sabha. “We would have expected the Chairman to have inquired if such a threat was indeed issued. Such comments grossly undermine the Chair who we believe is the final authority on conducting the House including suspension of members,” wrote Kharge.

Kharge asked Dhankhar to protect the people’s right to hold the government accountable in Parliament as the custodian of the House. “The Chairman should also kindly note that the government has escaped accountability on all crucial issues like serious border incursions by China, or continued unrest in Manipur, or the recent intrusion in the Lok Sabha by visitors who had been facilitated entry by a BJP MP,” he said.

“It would be distressing when history judges the presiding officers harshly for Bills passed without debate and not seeking accountability from the government. It is disappointing that the Hon’ble Chairman feels effecting suspensions facilitated legislative business by passing bills without discussion,” he said.

The INDIA bloc has accused the government of stifling its voice by practically leaving Parliament Opposition-less. The number of suspensions was unprecedented and surpassed the 63 lawmakers suspended in 1989 during a debate on a report on former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s assassination.

Forty-one of the Congress’s 48 MPs, including its Lok Sabha floor leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and his deputy Gaurav Gogoi, were among those suspended.

The suspensions continued amid important legislative business, including the passage of proposed laws to replace British-era criminal codes, regulate the telecom industry, and shape the selection of India’s top election officials, as the Opposition refused to budge on its demand for a statement from Shah on the Parliament security breach.