Parliament stops functioning after Hazare arrest

As the government should have anticipated, both houses of Parliament were paralysed today by opposition protests against the preventive detention of anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare and at least 1,000 of his supporters, including a couple of his close associates.

The opposition accused the government of ''murdering'' democracy; and likened the situation to the infamous 'Emergency' declared by Indira Gandhi in the mid-seventies, when people could be arrested without explanation.

Apart from the Bharatiya Janata Pary, the main opposition, the Left and virtually all other opposition parties demanded the suspension of Question Hour in both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha to discuss the issue in the backdrop of widespread reports of governmental corruption, and protested loudly when their plea was rejected.

The uproar began as soon as the two houses assembled for the day; no business was transacted in either house.

The Rajya Sabha was first adjourned till noon and then for the day. The Lok Sabha followed a similar pattern.

Leader of the opposition in the Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley alleged the government was indulging in the ''murder of democracy'', while senior BJP leader Yashwant Sinha tried to tell the Lok Sabha that ''there was an Emergency outside Parliament, there was an Emergency inside Parliament.''