Members of Parliament created a record in truancy during the New Year session of the Jatiya Sangsad that concluded on Wednesday.

There was lack of quorum on all but one of the 14 working days of the 21st session of the Seventh Jatiya Sangsad. The only fortunate day for the House was its closing day.

Quorum requires presence of at least 60 members out of 330.

The House witnessed quorum crisis even on the opening day when President Shahabuddin Ahmed delivered his annual address.

The number of MPs including ministers rose on the last day, presumably because Prime Minister and Leader of the House Sheikh Hasina delivered a 90-minute speech, touching upon various issues of political significance.

About 130 members were present during the PM's address and around 100 of them remained in the House all the time on that day. But on most of 13 other days the number ranged from 35 to 45.

Late start of proceedings obviously due to lack of quorum was an everyday affair except on the opening day. But barely an hour after the resumption, the House fell short of quorum.

Absence of ministers concerned and MPs often caused dislocation in scheduled businesses, forcing the Chair to either postpone those or make alternative arrangements.

Attendance of the Speaker, the Leader of the House and the Chief Whip he ^afty ^tar

was also irregular during the session.

The Deputy Speaker, with the help of five Panel of Chairmen, mainly ran the dull businesses.

One of the Panel Chairmen, Abdul Latif Siddiqui, hit newspaper headlines by allowing a minister to speak on a "closed item", going beyond a ruling by the Deputy Speaker. Siddiqui also bothered many by his irrelevant utterances.

Shortage of questions and notices, coupled with lack of important issues, made the proceedings dull. In fact, general discussion on a thanks-giving motion on the Presidential address helped the proceedings drag on. The monotonous and one-sided discussion was also cut short by more than one hour.

BNP lawmaker Dr. Abdul Moyeen Khan, who attended a day's sitting to save his membership, triggered a lively debate on the persistent parliamentary crisis due to continuous boycott of sessions by opposition legislators.

Akhtaruzzaman, who finally lost his seat for joining the parliament session defying his party decision, kept the House vibrant to some extent, fighting a lone battle against the Treasury Bench in the last few

sessions.

The session passed six bills including one that provides for three months' imprisonment and a penalty of Tk 10,000 for disregarding Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

Scrapping of the century-old Dramatic Performance Act was however a commendable job by the session.

The concluding sitting was marked by a tirade by the Prime Minister against The Daily Star on a wrong information.