New Delhi, April 24: Lok Sabha today suspended eight Congress MPs from the Telangana region for four days on charges of repeatedly stalling the proceedings of the House. The unprecedented move was aimed at warding off Opposition attack on the government for being weak and unable to tame its party members.

The extraordinary step came in the afternoon after the MPs repeatedly stalled the proceedings of the Lok Sabha, extending a handle to the Opposition to charge the government with sponsoring disruption of Parliament on day one of the resumed Budget session and use it to play as yet another example of UPA’s weakness.

Congress core committee comprising Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Sonia Gandhi and Pranab Mukherjee took the harsh decision after the party MPs refused to pay heed to their requests to allow the Lok Sabha to function.

Parliamentary affairs minister P.K. Bansal moved the motion seeking the suspension of the MPs for four days, from 2pm today, when Lok Sabha assembled after two adjournments and it was carried by a voice vote. Opposition NDA too supported the move.

The eight MPs are Ponnam Prabhakar, Madhu Yakshi Goud, M. Jagannath, KRG Reddy, G. Vivekananda, Balram Naik, Sukender Reddy Gutha and S. Rajaiah. Never in the past had the ruling party got its own MPs suspended for disrupting the House. The government was, however, quick to deny any link of the move to the demand for a separate Telangana state, realising it could be politically detrimental to the interests of the party.

“Suspension has nothing to do with the demand for a Telangana state. It was only to facilitate the functioning of the House. No political meaning should be read into it,” Bansal said. Asked if the precedent would be used against more disruptions in the future, Bansal pointed out that it was a “case specific response”.

The MPs, however, were more than happy for being suspended under the realisation that it would carry a good political message back home among the Telangana people. Interestingly, none of two members of Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS), the party championing the cause of Telangana, were present in the House to reap political mileage.

The move suited the ruling Congress both ways — it helped the party to silence the Opposition and underline that the government was serious to allow Parliament to function and on the flip side it earned some goodwill of its MPs in the Telangana region.

Immediately after the Lok Sabha was adjourned in the morning, Sonia and Pranab rushed Ghulam Nabi Azad and Vyalar Ravi to meet the MPs and request them to calm down and allow the House to run. The MPs refused to give up even after being told about suspension forcing the government to take the unprecedented decision.

The defiant MPs staged a sit-in in the Well of the House after the suspension motion was carried shouting slogans “Jai Jai Telangana”. They continued with it even after the House reassembled at 2:30 p.m. This forced the Chair to adjourn the House for the day.

Leader of Opposition Sushma Swaraj said the event had embarrassed the government as the MPs were speaking against their own government for not fulfilling the promise for a separate Telangana state.

The BJP’s support for the suspension of the MPs may not go down well for the party as it strongly supports the Telangana demand.