New Delhi, Sep 8 (IANS): Rajya Sabha chairman Hamid Ansari Thursday expressed concern over loss of time in the house due to "frequent interruptions and disturbances" and called upon members to make a collective endeavour to find ways of conveying concerns without transgressing on the rights of fellow MPs.
In his valedictory remarks before adjourning the house sine die at the end of monsoon session, he said it was a sad commentary on the rights of members to participate in the proceedings that no business could be transacted on 10 days and 53 hours were lost.
He said only 65 out of the admitted 500 questions were answered orally, 27 hours of the time allotted for discussion of bills could not be availed of, only one calling attention was taken up in the entire session against the target of two per week and only four short duration discussions could be held.
"As a result, many matters of public importance remained unattended. This is a sad commentary on the right, and duty, of the Members to participate meaningfully in the proceedings of the house. It calls for introspection. It should not be beyond our collective endeavour to seek ways of expressing concerns without transgressing on the rights of fellow Members and without infringing our own rules for conduct of business," he said.
Ansari, however, said the monsoon session had lived upto "its appellation with stormy proceedings".
He said highlights of the session included the proceedings relating to the motion for removal from office of Justice Soumitra Sen of the Calcutta High Court and the discussion on the issue relating to setting up of a Lokpal.
"On both the occasions, the house witnessed a very high quality of debate," Ansari said.
The chairman said three government bills were introduced and nine bills were passed or returned.
The session, which began Aug 1 had 26 sittings spread over about 85 hours.
According to Rajya Sabha officials, more than 53 hours were lost on issues like corruption, price rise, land acquisition in Uttar Pradesh, indictment of Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit in the Comptroller and Auditor General's report on the 2010 Commonwealth Games (CWG), police "atrocities" on Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) party workers in Delhi and farmers in Pune, Anna Hazare's fast for a strong Lokpal bill, appointment of the Lokayukta in the Gujarat, the blast near the Delhi High Court and arrest of a member of the Rajya Sabha in the cash-for-votes scam.
The house made up for this loss by often skipping the lunch recess and sitting late for about 14 hours.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh introduced 11 new ministers to the house while 13 members were elected or re-elected to the house from Goa, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal.
The bills passed or returned by the Rajya Sabha included the Jawaharlal Institute of Post-graduate Medical Education and Research, Puducherry (Amendment) Bill; Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Amendment Bill; National Council for Teacher Education (Amendment) Bill; Human Organs (Amendment) Bill; Indian Medical Council (Amendment) Bill; State Bank of India (Subsidiary Banks Laws) Amendment Bill and Customs (Amendment and Validation) Bill.
The house witnessed short duration discussions on growing incidents of terrorism in the country, CWG games, growing incidence of corruption in the country and problems being faced by Sri Lankan Tamils.
During the Session, 500 starred questions and 3,875 unstarred questions were admitted and answered.
Question hour could not be held on 14 occasions due to interruptions.