Somnath blames media for house disruption

Bhopal, May 23 (UNI) Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee today blamed the media for passively encouraging indecorous and unparliamentary behaviour by members in legislatures and appealed the media to maintain restraint so that people's faith in democracy was not undermined.

Stating that incidents of unruly behaviour by members and disruption of proceedings of the House have increased in recent years, Mr Chatterjee said unfortunately the media passively encouraged such behaviour by giving wide publicity to such acts while ignoring good speeches.

Regrettably, some legislators on the wrong assumption that disrupting proceedings is more effective take recourse in unacceptable methods like registering their presence in the well of the House and shouting slogans from there, he said in his address after distributing parliamentary excellence awards instituted by the Madhya Pradesh Assembly.

Five legislators, five ministers, six journalists and five Assembly officials were decorated with 'awards' for their outstanding performance during 2004-08. The awards carry Rs 21,000 in cash, citation, silver memento and a shawl.

''Unruly behaviour are not well received, but undermine the people's faith and trust in our democratic institutions'', he said.

Later talking to reporters, Mr Chatterjee said commitment towards upholding democratic traditions was more important than a code of conduct.

He, however, said the parliamentary committee on framing code of conduct held 20 sittings in the last four years and its report was expected in the next monsoon session. ''Rules were already there, but its implementation was important than going in for new rules'', he observed.

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