Eight Opposition MPs were suspended from the Lok Sabha for the remainder of the Budget Session on Tuesday after they allegedly tore up papers and threw them at the speaker’s chair.

In Speaker Om Birla’s absence, Krishna Prasad Tenneti, a member of the panel of chairpersons, was presiding over the proceedings in the Lower House at the time.

Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju moved a resolution seeking their suspension, which was adopted by the House.

The members who have been suspended are Congress leaders Hibi Eden, Amarinder Singh Raja Warring, Manickam Tagore, Gurjeet Singh Aujla, Chamala Kiran Kumar Reddy, Prashant Padole and Dean Kuriakose, and S Venkatesan from the Communist Party of India (Marxist).

After the resolution was adopted, the Lok Sabha was adjourned for the day amid a ruckus.

The proceedings on Tuesday were marked by multiple adjournments amid protests by the Opposition after Congress leader Gandhi was again prevented from quoting an excerpt of an unpublished memoir of former Indian Army chief Manoj Mukund Naravane about the political decision-making during the 2020 border tensions between India and China.

Gandhi has been mentioning the excerpt during the debate on the Motion of Thanks to the President’s address.

Congress MPs began protesting in the well of the House after Tenneti called on other members to speak before Gandhi had completed his speech.

Earlier, Tenneti had asked Gandhi to restrict his speech to the President’s address.

In response, Gandhi said that the conflict between China and the United States was a major global issue reflected in the Union Budget and the President’s address, and added that India also faced a conflict with China.

The chair then moved on to other speakers.

Following the suspension of its MPs on Tuesday, Congress leaders and other MPs staged a protest in the Parliament complex.

“This is an attack on parliamentary democracy,” the party said on social media. “Congress will not be silenced. We will continue to speak for the nation.”

In a social media post, Gandhi said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was “too afraid to let me speak in Parliament about Naravane”.