In an attempt to nullify the Opposition parties’ objection to the suspension of Question hour, the Rajya Sabha’s research wing has pulled out statistics from the last five years which reveal that nearly 60% of the time allotted for the hour has been lost due to disruptions.
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Between 2015-19, Rajya Sabha held a total of 332 sittings. Out of the 332 hours available for Question Hour (one hour per sitting), only 133 hours and 17 minutes were spent raising questions and obtaining oral replies from the concerned Ministers.
The lowest time on Question Hour was spent in 2018 when only 22% of the allotted time was utilised for asking and answering questions. The best performance in the five years was in 2017 when 57.73% of the available time was used.
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In widespread outrage, Opposition parties had accused the government of using the COVID-19 pandemic as an excuse to do away with all instruments of accountability. The comments from the Congress, the Trinamool Congress, the DMK and others forced the government to clarify by the end of the day that unstarred questions, for which only written replies are given, would be allowed.
