new delhi it is not just the question hour and other proceedings in parliament where mps are founding missing attendance at parliamentary standing committees bodies that vet the functioning of union ministries is another indicator of how serious our parliamentarians are about their workan annual audit for 200708 of the functioning of standing committees during the last lok sabha reveals shocking details with many mps earning the dubious distinction of not having attended a single meeting in the entire year screen queenturnedpolitician jaya prada nahata who triggered a virtual war in the samajwadi party over her renomination from rampur did not show up for any of 26 meetings of departmentallyrelated standing committee on information technology harish nagpal and rubab sayeda kept her company in the completely missing list in contrast mps like cpmdiscard abdullakutty and sanjay shamrao dhotre attended 23 meetings each a feat of sorts by current parliamentary standardsthis sorry pattern is repeated in the attendance records of all the 12 major committees which met regularly between august 2007 and 2008 to oversee the working of union ministriesironically there is a scramble among mps to be on important standing committees since a seat on these panels gives them leverage with officials the meetings are hardly an austere affair with the ministries and public sector undertakings required to foot the bill for tours of members who are invariably lodged in luxurious places and have fleets of cars at their disposalthese incentives however are not enough for a few for instance janardhan waghmare skipped all 13 meetings of the agriculture committee as did former union minister arun shourie who was a member of the defence panel likewise rlds anuradha chaudhary and nandkumar chauhan did not show up at any of the 14 meetings of the committee on energy during the year bsps kailash nath singh yadav was marginally better having attending one meetingattendance at the urban development panel was just as bad with v k malhotra avtar singh bhadana pappu yadav and babulal marandi skipping all 17 meetings the committee however also had surendra motilal patel who was present throughout salim shervani and damodar barku shingada were not part of any of the 15 discussions of the committee on external affairs while mukhtar abbas naqvi could spare time for just one meetingcongresss rajesh mishra turned up for two of the 30 meetings of the committee on finance in the food consumer affairs and public distribution committee which met 15 times during the year baliram kashyap came for two and suresh angadi for three meetingsthe labour committee met 20 times but dhan singh rawat couldnt make himself available even for one meeting while renubala pradhan and chowdhury mohd aslam each showed up twicein contrast there were many mps who chose to be part of the discussions at the agriculture committee in the 13 meetings in 200708 cpis prabodh panda attended all harish rawat and rajasekara murthy attended 12 girdharilal bhargava came for 10 and manoranjan bhakta for nine the defence