Privilege Motion | 05 Jul 2019

Recently, a member of the Indian parliament has moved a privilege motion against a TV channel.

• The breach of privilege motion is moved against a private Hindi news channel and its Editor for reporting that members' first speech in the Lok Sabha was plagiarised.
  • Plagiarism is a practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as one's own.
• Parliamentary privileges are certain rights and immunities enjoyed by members of Parliament, individually and collectively, so that they can effectively discharge their functions.
• The Constitution (Article 105) mentions two privileges,i.e. freedom of speech in Parliament and right of publication of its proceedings.
• Rule No 222 in Chapter 20 of the Lok Sabha Rule Book and correspondingly Rule 187 in Chapter 16 of the Rajya Sabha rulebook governs privilege.
• The Speaker of Loksabha and Rajya Sabha Chairperson is the first level of scrutiny of a privilege motion.
  • The Speaker/Chairperson can decide on the privilege motion himself or herself or refer it to the privileges committee of Parliament.
  • If the Speaker/Chairperson gives consent under respective rules, the member concerned is given an opportunity to make a short statement.