Five-star bill for accommodating waiting MPs leaves govt worried `35cr

NEW DELHI: Hit by a `35 crore hotel bill for lawmakers who are yet to take up official accommodation, the government wants to change the rules to limit MPs’ hotel stay to the days when Parliament is in session.

As on April 6, 35 of the 543 members of the 16th Lok Sabha, which completes a year in a little over a month, were still staying in the Capital’s The Ashok hotel, sources said. The number was much higher in the weeks after the Lok Sabha results were is the sum that the government has been billed by The Ashok for the stay of MPs who have yet to move to official accommodation

declared on May 16, 2014.

At a meeting of the cabinet committee on accommodation on April 9, urban development minister M Venkaiah Naidu pushed for change in rules, questioning the need for the government to pay for lawmakers’ hotel stay when Parliament was not meeting and MPs were not in the Capital, sources said.

“When Parliament is not in session, the rooms are either locked or occupied by either MPs’ staff or their acquaintances. Why should the government pay for this? If rules need to be changed, we should change them,” a source quoted Naidu as saying.

A suite in the state-run luxury hotel, where MPs awaiting accommodation are put up, commands `12,000 a day and a room `9,000. Most of those who are staying in the hotel are among the 314 firsttime Lok Sabha members.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 6