Cong MP Rajani Patil suspended from RS for recording House proceedings

New Delhi, Feb 10: Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar suspended Congress MP Rajani Patil on Friday for the remainder of the current budget session for filming House proceedings.

The suspension comes after she tweeted a video from inside the House in which opposition lawmakers were seen protesting Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Thursday response to the Motion of Thanks. Reacting to it, Patil said it was not fair to give her the harshest punishment as she had not done anything deliberately.

Dhankhar, who had earlier in the day indicated that action would be taken against those who had filmed a ruckus during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's speech on Thursday, asked leaders of political parties to express their views on the issue.

"I belong to a freedom fighter's family and I should be given natural justice. I have not done anything deliberately," Patil told reporters. "Accusing me like this and straightaway giving me the sternest punishment is not fair. I was deliberately named and I felt humiliated," she said.

The motion against Patil was adopted to suspend her for the remainder of the budget session, pending a report from the parliamentary privileges committee on the issue.

Suspension of Patil was following procedure evolved in 2016 in similar matter involving Bhagwant Mann: Dhankhar

The suspension of Rajani Patil from the Rajya Sabha for the remainder of the Budget Session was done following ''the procedure'' evolved in 2016 when then AAP MP Bhagwant Maan was found live-streaming proceedings of Parliament on social media, Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar said on Friday.

Mann, now the chief minister of Punjab, was suspended for the entire session based on the recommendations of a committee which had then BJP MP Kirit Somaiya and K C Venugopal of the Congress, among others.

Patil was suspended for videographing the proceedings of the House with clips making their way into the public domain and being ''extensively used by a Twitter account. The decision was taken in view of the transgression of the directions given by the Chairman on July 28 last year,'' Dhankhar said.