New Delhi, Nov. 30: Where slogan-shouting failed, absenteeism among MPs succeeded today — in forcing an early end to the Lok Sabha Question Hour meant for members to grill the government.

Only two of the 20 questions slated for the day were asked because the MPs who were to ask the rest did not show up, shortening the session by more than half. Thirty-six MPs were listed to ask questions — often more than one MP has the same question — but only four turned up.

Speaker Meira Kumar adjourned the House at 11.23am. Question Hour starts at 11am and is supposed to run on till noon.

The adjournment was particularly ironic because the Speaker was at the time braving attempts by Left MPs to disrupt Question Hour over a central team that has been sent to assess law and order in Bengal.

Parliament is routinely adjourned during Question Hour because of loud, unscheduled arguments between members that prevent the conduct of scheduled business. It is rarer for Question Hour to be cut short because of absenteeism.

“It is a matter of concern for all members that we should have such levels of absenteeism among members slated to ask questions,” Meira later told reporters.

A visibly distraught parliamentary affairs minister said the absenteeism had raised questions about the need for a Question Hour. “If members are not interested, we can reply to all questions in writing. All parties need to think about absenteeism,” Pawan Bansal said.

PTI quoted Parliament sources as saying that it cost Rs 14 lakh to run the Lok Sabha for an hour, the bill including MPs’ transport and food, electricity and other House-related expenses. Apart from this, a lot of money, time and energy are spent on preparing the answers.

Bureaucrats had turned up on Sunday for the mountain of paperwork needed, and the government had to arrange their transport and must pay them overtime.

The two questions that were asked related to expansion of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme and levels of infiltration across India’s borders.

L. Rajagopal and G.S. Basavaraj asked the question on the rural job scheme while Adhir Chowdhury and Pradeep Majhi quizzed the government on infiltration.

Questions that could not be taken up involved the ministries of defence, commerce and industry, communications and information technology, labour and employment, social justice, rural development, shipping and panchayati raj.

Questions raised by MPs in Parliament belong to two categories — starred (marked with a star) and unstarred.

Each ministry is allotted two days a week — one for the Lok Sabha and the other for the Rajya Sabha — on which the ministers or their deputies have to respond to these questions.

Unstarred questions are answered only in writing. Printed questions and answers are made available to MPs and the media, and are later uploaded on the Internet.

Starred questions are taken up during Question Hour. The ministry concerned circulates a written reply to the question raised by the member. The member then has the opportunity to orally raise in the House two “supplementary” questions to which the minister then replies orally.

The oral nature of supplementary questions, and their answers, often trigger debates among members on larger, related issues.

Human resource deve- lopment minister Kapil Sibal, while responding to a sta- rred question, faced the anger of members last week over plans to make Class X boards optional in Central Board of Secondary Education schools.