Why yesterday’s calamatist parliament session came to be.

The central government on Tuesday had set in motion an attempt to apply ‘the guillotine’ – a constitutional statute that is applied when there is no hope of parliament functioning normally and that dysfunction is affecting the governing of the country.

Once the guillotine is applied, all outstanding demands for grants from all governmental departments will be put to vote at once whether they are discussed or not.

With protests aborting all business in both Houses since the session started on March 5, the government presented a revised list of business on Tuesday that mentioned applying the guillotine on the demands for grants at 5pm. It could not be done on Tuesday so the government did it on Wednesday and passed the Finance Bill (the budget).

A three-day whip issued to BJP members on Monday indicated the ruling party’s seriousness about the matter and the opposition should have taken note of it and STFU.

Passing the Finance Bill is a constitutional obligation as without that the government can not spend any money effective March 31 2018. Although the session is to continue till April 6, the government applied the guillotine early as it felt that the opposition will let no business happen in the house in any case so why wait till the last day.

Further, the government has been listing every day a discussion on the banking scam but the opposition has refused to relent and continues to disrupt.

While Opposition members have been protesting against the banking scam, BJP ally Telugu Desam Party and the AIADMK have been agitating on state-specific issues, plunging Parliament into chaos. The presiding officers of both houses have been adjourning the houses in the face of members rushing into the well and chanting slogans.

This is a case of everyone being in the wrong.

I am surely not happy about the application of guillotine by the government, but I do hold that it is equally the opposition’s fault that they have created this situation where instead of reasoned debate, you have chaos and bills are passed with no discussion and no deliberation.

Apart from a long heavy sigh, I really dunno what else I can do…