Parliament Costs 2.5 Lakh Per Minute To Run. 3 Days Already Lost This Session

The Monsoon session of Parliament has, as expected, been a stormy one, but behind the headlines about repeated adjournments lies a real cost - Rs 2.5 lakh for every minute the Parliament is in session during active hours. 

The current session began on Monday and two key issues which have led to a logjam in both Houses - Lok Sabha more than the Rajya Sabha - have been the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar, which the opposition has dubbed an attempt to help the ruling coalition, and the opposition parties' demand for a discussion on Operation Sindoor, which was India's response to the terrorist attack in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam.

Each house of Parliament is supposed to be productive for six hours a day - excluding one hour for lunch - and, according to former parliamentary affairs minister Pawan Bansal in 2012, running the Parliament for one minute while in session costs Rs 2.5 lakh - or Rs 1.25 lakh each for the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. 

These figures are now a conservative estimate, given that they are from over a decade ago, but, in the absence of updated ones, that is what we will use for the calculations to follow.

There have been three days in the monsoon session, which means each House should have functioned for 18 hours. Given the adjournments, however, according to data from non-profit PRS legislative research, the Rajya Sabha has functioned for 4.4 hours and the Lok Sabha for a measly 0.9 hours, or 54 minutes.

This means that the disruptions have cost the taxpayer Rs 10.2 crore for the Rajya Sabha (816 minutes lost multiplied by Rs 1.25 lakh) and Rs 12.83 crore for the Lok Sabha (1,026 minutes it did not function multiplied by Rs 1.25 lakh). 

So, just three days of disruption have cost tax-paying citizens Rs 23 crore.

Point, Counter-Point

On Tuesday, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju had slammed the opposition and accused it of wasting taxpayers' money.

"The Opposition party leaders are all present here. In the Business Advisory meeting, it was decided that there would be a discussion on Operation Sindoor, and a fixed time was agreed upon. All issues cannot be taken up at once. Yet, instead of cooperating, they came with placards and disrupted the House," he said in the Lok Sabha

"They're protesting with pillows, bringing placards -- despite agreeing not to. This is not acceptable. If they wanted a discussion and we were ready, then why disrupt the House?" he asked.

Congress MP Randeep Surjewala accused the government of not letting the Parliament function and disallowing discussion. "Votes of 52 lakh people of Bihar are being cut... Isn't this a conspiracy to end democracy? It shows that this government wants to end democracy in this country. We only want to discuss this," he said on Wednesday