New Delhi, Dec 13 (EFE).- Two men intruded into the lower house of the Indian parliament and opened smoke canisters on Wednesday causing chaos.
The incident coincided with the 22nd anniversary of the deadly attack on the country’s parliament in which several security personnel were killed in 2001.
Footage from the Lok Sabha session showed a man jumping from the visitors’ gallery to the legislator’s desks and heading towards the well of the house.
Another man followed him with a canister from the visitor’s gallery that emitted a yellow smoke.
“(We) saw two young men unleash foul smelling yellow coloured gas from canisters inside Parliament gallery. MPs rushed to grab these men. One person was raising some slogans,” said Congress parliamentarian Gaurav Gogoi on X, formerly Twitter.
The attack raises serious questions about the new Parliament building’s security, he said.
The new parliament, a project of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist government, is adjacent to the older one and was inaugurated in September.
Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla addressed the legislators on the security breach in Parliament and assured them an investigation of the attack was in progress and that everything was under control.
“In the primary investigation, it has been found that it (yellow gas) was just smoke and there is no need to worry,” he said and adjourned the house till Thursday.
In 2001, the Indian Parliament in New Delhi was attacked by five armed assailants. At least nine people were killed in the attack including security personnel, in addition to attackers. EFE
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