Since we didn't get the permission to witness the event, we tried to reconstruct the scene here through people's memory and description of it. An edited version was published in the Indian Express on December 3, 2010.
Here is the full story.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, December 2, 2010
In the nine rows, as they sat or stood according to their designations, the hundreds of Members of Parliament and the ministers looked like school children posing for a group photo. They giggled, adjusted their clothes and poses, and smiled often.
Only the camaraderie that was infectious at the moment just before the session and the chaos that has been disrupting the work, was fleeting, only captured through the lens of a special camera.
Dressed for the photo shoot, a tradition, a ritual that would capture them in one frame, a visual record to be hung in the inner lobby of the Lok Sabha, the members reached before time, smiled too often, and cracked jokes.
The shoot was scheduled for 9:30 a.m.
No 2G scam was going to come in the way of their smiles as they looked into the camera that rotated, and clicked, capturing the moment for eternity.
For the South Mumbai MP Milind Deora, the session was bitter sweet, a reminder that all of them should take the sense of pride that they felt at the moment when the shutterbugs clicked farther than the stands.
“In a school photo shoot, you have different houses but you still come together for a larger purpose. That was missing. It didn't manifest itself in this session,” Deora said. “Last time, when it was my first photo shoot, it was not in the backdrop of this unproductive session. Why can't this happen everyday, why can't we let our sense of pride in belonging to this institution precede our differences and have constructive debates?”
As newly elected members, one of the first things they see are the photographs, hundreds of representatives smiling out of one frame, the sense of unity superseding the diversity, of the differences of political agendas.
It was the former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru who first commissioned the group photo in 1956 and since then it has been a ritual, an institution in itself.
Gopal Krishan Datt, the photographer and son of late Anant Ram Dutt, who Nehru had asked to click the group photo way back in the 1950s, stood on the stone platform and dictated the photo session to the hundreds of ministers and Members of Parliament and ministers who teased him and in turn were made to smile by the photographer who has been shooting the group photos of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha members since 1967.
“People dress up. It is a special moment. I spoke with Farooq Abdullah and he was asking me when the photo would be ready,” he said.
It was a colorful frame, too.
Arjun Ram Meghwal, an MP from Bikane in Rajasthan, wore a multicolor turban saying he wore it to represent the hues of his state. After all, the photo is an expression of the people, too, and who they chose to represent them, an MP said.
Farooq Abdullah wore a black achkan, and a traditional Karakul topi, to showcase his Kashmiriyat, and Satabdi Roy, All India Trinamool Congress MP from Birbhum in West Bengal, veered away from her traditional churidars and kurtas to a saree for the shoot.
Many young MPs wore Nehru jackets like Varun Gandhi who wore a peach colored one, and Rahul Gandhi, who wore white kurta and pajama with a sombre Nehru jacket.
Among some of the best dressed for the occasion, according to a Parliament official who was present for the session that is done once every five years and for every Lok Sabha composition, were Dinesh Trivedi Trivedi, All India Trinamool Congress MP from Barrackpur in West Bengal who wore a formal bandh gala suit and Supriya Sadanand Sule, Nationalist Congress Party MP from Baramati in Maharashtra who wore a green silk suit.
Shiv Sena MP from Kalyan Anand Prakash Paranjpe chose to wear a suit complete with a tie for the occasion. It was his first photo session, a ritual he was looking forward to. In 2008 when he was elected, he didn't have the “privilege” to stand in the temporary stands, hidden from public view by boards put up in between the enclosures to give the moment the sanctity it deserves.
“I wear suits very often to corporate meetings. It is a really a privilege to be there among the 543 members. Everyone was there. It was a precious moment, everyone was happy, and it was one of the most memorable moments,” he said.
When he arrived at 9:15 a.m., the stands were already full. UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi in a blue and green saree and opposition leader and BJP member Sushma Swaraj in an ochre yellow saree were already seated in the front row meant for the cabinet ministers. There was excitement, buzz, and amity.
“People fight on the floor. But they are friends outside,” he said. “I thought suit was better. I don't wear typical politician dress. To stand in the photo gallery, it is really a privilege.”
There were new faces, too like Putul Devi, wife of Late JDU Leader Digvijay Singh, who contested on her own from Banka in Bihar and is now an elected independent member, one of the eight independents. She took the oath on Thursday and wore a cream saree for the occasion.
But as the photographer downed the shutters of an Eastman Kodak which Anant Ram, who was a photographer to the British officers and Indian royalty, b ought for Rs 100 in 1914 and has used since Nehru asked him to shoot the members in one frame, the members got off the stands, walked to their seats in the house and the scams and differences took over. But then, the moment, a rare one of smiles and handshakes, had been preserved.
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