Lok Sabha MPs Hanuman Beniwal of the Rashtriya Loktantrik Party, Gurjeet Singh Aujla of the Congress, and Bahujan Samaj Party's Malook Nagar are being hailed as 'saviours' by other MPs for helping nab the intruders who breached the security of Parliament.
Beniwal, Nagar, Aujla and a group of other MPs managed to overpower two intruders who jumped into the House chamber and released yellow gas from their canisters.
In a major security breach on the anniversary of the 2001 Parliament terror attack, two persons jumped into the Lok Sabha chamber from the public gallery during Zero Hour and released yellow gas from canisters and shouted slogans before being overpowered by the MPs.
Around the same time, two persons, including a woman, also sprayed coloured gas from canisters while shouting slogans ‘tanashahi nahi chalegi’ (dictatorship won't be accepted) outside the Parliament premises.
All four are now in police custody along with a fifth associate.
'Saviour' MPs Recount What Happened
“During Zero Hour, several MPs were present in the House. All of a sudden, two people jumped down from the public gallery and tried to reach closer to the Speaker’s Chair jumping over the benches,” said Hanuman Beniwal, who caught one of the two persons with the help of other members.
Beniwal is the MP from Nagaur in Rajasthan and has recently been elected to the state Assembly from his stronghold of Khinvsar. He is likely to resign from the Lok Sabha seat soon.
“They had kept bomb-like things inside their shoes. When we caught them, they released the gas which created fear among several MPs,” Hanuman Beniwal added, terming the incident a "big security lapse".
Congress MP from Punjab's Amritsar, Gurjeet Aujla, said, "I had just finished raising an issue when two people jumped into the House chamber. One of them was moving towards the Chair when Hanuman Beniwal caught him. When we rushed to catch the second person, I saw he had something in his hand which he started waving. We snatched it from him and threw it out for the safety of the members as it was releasing a gas.”
“The two protesters were raising slogans like ‘tanashahi band karo (stop dictatorship)… They have given a big message. The government should pay attention,” he added.
Recalling the incident, BSP MP Malook Nagar told reporters,
“Zero Hour proceeding was on. Then a loud sound came from behind as if someone fell down. We saw a person had jumped into the Lok Sabha chamber from the visitors’ gallery while another was hanging. Then from one side Hanuman Beniwal swung into action and caught one of the two people, while I and other MPs got hold of the other person rushing from the other side".
A number of MPs came up and thanked the three MPs, praised them on X (formerly Twitter), and even clicked selfies with them.
The two protesters have been identified as Sagar Sharma and D Manoranjan. Sharma had come to the visitors’ gallery as a guest of BJP MP from Mysuru Pratap Simha.
The two jumped into the chamber from the public gallery at around 1 pm. While one was spotted jumping over the benches, the other was left dangling from the gallery before jumping into the chamber, according to several MPs who were present in the House at the time of incident.
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