Something rotten!

Parliament had to be suspended for more than half an hour on Wednesday after Minister Dinesh Gunawardena brought to the notice of the House that a strong smell was emanating from within the Chamber. The sittings were suspended and the Serjeant-at-Arms along with security personnel searched under the seats of MPs and elsewhere to see where the smell could have originated from. The search yielded no results and the House was back in session. And everyone thought the rot had set in a long time ago.

Head turner

It may have been smelly inside the Chamber but on Thursday there was quite a lot of excitement elsewhere in Parliament when Sri Lanka’s Heads of Missions serving aboard who are in Colombo for a three day seminar came there to meet with several MPs. The excitement had nothing to do with the Ambassadors’/High Commissioners’ presence there but the presence of the Public Relations Officer of the Foreign Ministry, actress Anarkali who also sat through the meeting causing a lot of distraction.

Smooth sailing

JVP national list MP Ramalingam Chandrasekeran was unanimously appointed the Deputy Chairman of Committees on Thursday. Surprisingly the UNP which had earlier wanted to field its own candidate for the post decided not to do so and Mr. Chandrasekeran had a smooth accession to the post.