Congress raps MPs who bunked Lokpal vote

The Congress has vowed to take action against lawmakers who stayed away from the vote over the constitutional amendment regarding the Lokpal Bill, resulting in the motion being rejected in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday, media reports said.

Despite "repeated reminders, SMS-es and phone calls" at least ten MPs were absent during the vote, Minister of State in the Prime Minister´s Office V Narayanasamy told a news channel, resulting in an embarrassing loss for the Congress-led government's move.

The MPs now face a show-cause notice followed by some sort of disciplinary action, the minister told the news channel.

Congress President Sonia Gandhi, meanwhile, lambasted the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for the failure of the constitutional amendment over the Lokpal Bill in the Lok Sabha, saying the incident exposed the main opposition party's duplicity.

"The BJP had actually committed for constitutional status for the Lokpal Bill in the standing committee and yesterday they voted against it and denied constitutional status," Gandhi, the chairperson of the ruling United Progressive Alliance (UPA) coalition said.

"Yesterday we have seen the real face of the BJP...we wanted to give a solid Lokpal Bill but they refused," she said.

The Rajya Sabha on Wednesday is expected to take up the Lokpal Bill after it was passed by the Lok Sabha on Tuesday, though the fate of the long-awaited anti-graft law appeared largely uncertain over burgeoning dissent among lawmakers.

Some reports said that the bill might be taken up on Thursday.

Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Pawan Bansal said, "One thing is certain, it cannot be taken up unless Rajya Sabha decides to sit late like we did in Lok Sabha. Then only perhaps it could be passed today. Otherwise it will be passed tomorrow, but it will be taken up for consideration today."

Questions were raised on how an increasingly isolated government would ensure that its draft of the Lokpal Bill, which has been widely criticised as weak, sails smoothly in the upper house, after MPs in the lower house appeared far from a consensus over the thorny legislation.

MPs from the four Left parties, Biju Janata Dal (BJD), All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), Samajwadi Party (SP), Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) had walked out from voting in the Lok Sabha over the Bill on Tuesday.

It was the absence of this large chunk of the lawmakers that was seen as one of the reasons behind the failure of the constitutional amendment that would grant the ombudsman proposed under the Lokpal Bill.

The Rajya Sabha campaign of the Lokpal Bill is being seen as an acid test for the coalition government -- constituted by the Congress and its allies NCP, DMK, Trinamool Congress, LJP and RLD -- that has 93 members in the 245-seat House.

On Tuesday, an eleven-hour marathon debate concluded with the fruition of a four-decade-old effort to install a national ombudsman, however the constitutional amendment mooted to grant it the a statute label was defeated for a lack of majority.