Home Minister speaks to MPs through media, this is unacceptable: Chidambaram

New Delhi: Congress leader P Chidambaram Friday asserted that Home Minister Amit Shah should make a statement in Parliament over the security breach in Lok Sabha and cited the precedent of then Home Minister L K Advani making a statement in the House in the aftermath of the 2001 Parliament attack.

Accusing Shah of speaking through the media to the Members of Parliament, he said, "This is unacceptable".

In a post in X, Chidambaram, a former home minister, said, "After the terrible attack on Parliament on 13th December 2001, Home Minister L K Advani made a statement in Parliament. That is the right precedent." It is the home minister who should make a statement in Parliament on behalf of the government, he said.

"The Hon'ble Home Minister speaks through the media to the Members of Parliament. This is unacceptable. He should come before Parliament and make a statement," the Congress leader said.

Chidambaram was referring to Shah's interview to Rahul Kanwal at Agenda Aaj Tak where the Home Minister spoke about Parliament security breach.

Earlier, in another post, Chidambaram hit out at the BJP over the suspension of 14 MPs, saying this was no deterrent to those who breached security and was intended to silence the opposition.

While Derek O'Brien of the Trinamool Congress was suspended from the Rajya Sabha on Thursday, 13 opposition MPs, including nine from the Congress and the DMK's Kanimozhi, were suspended from the Lok Sabha.

On Wednesday, two persons jumped into the Lok Sabha chamber from the visitors' gallery, shouted slogans and released coloured smoke from canisters that triggered panic and chaos in the House.

In his post on X, Chidambaram said, "Politics under BJP has plunged to new depths. If the Opposition wants the Hon'ble PM or the Hon'ble HM to make a statement in Parliament on the terrible breach of security on December 13, their members will be suspended."

"Suspension of MPs is no deterrent to those who breached security. It is intended to silence the Opposition," he said.

The Congress on Thursday described the suspension of opposition MPs as a "murder of democracy" and accused the BJP government of reducing Parliament to a "rubber stamp".