Media Eye News Bureau: BJP lawmaker Varun Gandhi, in a letter to Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan, requested her to initiate a ‘movement’ to urge financially advantaged Lok Sabha members to forego their salaries for the remaining term of the lower house.
He wrote, “A voluntary exercise such as this would send a positive message across the nation regarding the level of sensitivity we possess as elected representatives,” he added, “India's inequality gap is widening further every day. A growing divide is detrimental to our democracy and we as public representatives must be seen to be more responsive to the socio-economic realities of our country.”
He also suggested creating an independent, statutory body to ascertain the affordability of the move and the need for an increase in fiscal compensation for lawmakers and added that over the last decade, salaries of parliamentarians have increased by 400 per cent, a rise that is unlikely even in the profit driven private sector.
