Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee did some tough talking with MPs who tried to disrupt the proceedings as parliament assembled for the winter session Wednesday.
As soon as the lower house began its business for the day, with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh present on the treasury benches, members of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) rushed to the speaker's chair to protest the arrest of a colleague.
Crowding around the middle of the house, they shouted slogans demanding the release of Mohammad Tahir Khan, the BSP MP from Sultanpur, who was arrested in Uttar Pradesh last week after a clash with Samajwadi Party workers.
"I will not allow such indiscipline in the house," thundered Chatterjee, ordering the MPs to allow business to proceed. "I will suspend you, I am warning you."
Standing up, he repeated the warning forcefully as the shouting MPs persisted.
Water Resources Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi and Ministers of State for Parliamentary Affairs B.K. Handique and Suresh Pachauri intervened to pacify the MPs and persuade them to return to their seats. Question hour resumed after this.
--Indo-Asian News Service