Seats for sale: 75 percent of Rajya Sabha seats will now come under the management category

It’s an open secret that many of the MPs who made it to the Rajya Sabha, have done so by flexing their monetary muscle. To prevent money from influencing future Rajya Sabha elections, the UPA government has decided to enact a legislation to convert 75 percent of the houses seats into ‘management seats and reserve them for candidates with ‘truckloads of money’.

The bill, a draft of which is available with Humor Unplugged, states that in the future seats for the Rajya Sabha will be auctioned through public auction to the highest bidder. These seats will belong to a category called management quota ala medicine and engineering and the revenue earned will be used to run parliament and reduce the government’s fiscal deficit. The highest bidder will be nominated as deputy speaker while others will get cushioned seats, mini fridge chocolates, earphones, dedicated LCD screens, FM radio and movie channel, based on individual bids. The lowest bidders will be moved to the Deve Gowda bench (the last row) and will have to do with a Japanese fan and stale peanuts.

“So far politicians like Vijay Mallya and Rajeev Chandrasekhar have been buying their way into the Rajya Sabha.  These guys have been purchasing votes from two penny politicians from all parties to get into parliament. Why should politicians get money from them? This money has to come to the government; we have already sustained plenty of losses in the 2G auction and didn’t want a repeat here (A Raja eating away the money)…and we want Rajya Sabha to turn into a revenue stream for the government,” said MP Chavvani Lal, head of the Group of Ministers constituted by the government on the issue.

Humor Unplugged has learnt that the government had actively considered roping in disgraced former IPL chief Lalit Modi to head the process of commercialization of Rajya Sabha. The plan was however dropped due to stiff resistance from a few quarters, sources said. The government plans to implement the move soon so that it can push many of its candidates into Rajya Sabha under management quota, while it is in power.  The NDA has opposed the move and said that it will fight the bill tooth and nail as soon as it is moved in parliament. No sooner had BJP spokesperson said this, two MPs from Janata ‘Dull’ (U) pounced on him and thrashed him black and blue. After the sound thrashing, the JD(U) MPs walked away saying that the party’s alliance with BJP was intact and they didn’t have “any plans to come out of the NDA in the short term”. 

A 'Rich' member of parliament from Rajya Sabha arrives outside the Indian parliament on Friday. This guy claims to have entered the parliament to serve the citizens of India.