The House unexpectedly saw the ministers or any lawmakers from the BNP-led ruling coalition refrain from making any comment or responding to the opposition on power crisis and the movement for an end to it in different areas of the capital as well as several districts across the country.

Terming the opposition contention on people's movement for power supply an 'old matter', Deputy Speaker Akhter Hamid Siddique rejected the demand for holding a discussion on it after adjourning the scheduled business of the House.

AL lawmakers walked out the House protesting rejection of their demand but within two minutes party lawmaker Shahjahan Khan came back to raise the issue and his colleagues followed him to the House.

On a point of order, party legislator Abdur Razzak raised the issue and demanded discussion on power crisis.

The AL presidium member said people in the city last night took to the streets as they did not get electricity. They are now in a movement for power supply, and thousands of people are demonstrating in Sayedabad, Shanir Akhra, Mirpur, Tejgaon areas. And despite repeated requests from the opposition in parliament, the crisis is yet to be resolved.

Razzak said the country is plagued with scarcity of electricity. Ramadan fasting is also being affected as people are not getting electricity at the time of iftar. So, they are forced to come out of their houses and take to the streets, he added.

Another AL lawmaker, Suranjit Sengupta, demanded that all proceedings of the House be adjourned for holding a general discussion on power crisis across the country.

The government has destroyed power sector through corruption such as taking 'commission', and people want to know what it has done in the last five years of its tenure, he said.

"It is an unusual situation…Production in mills and factories has stalled. The matter must be discussed in parliament today (yesterday) and the government must explain the power situation," he said.

As the deputy speaker did not respond to the opposition's persistent plea for discussing the crucial issue by adjourning other business, agitating AL members left the House at 12:22 pm but returned after two minutes.

AL legislators Mahbubur Rahman and Farukh Khan, and BNP's Altaf Hossain Chowdhury, who is a minister without portfolio, Ferdous Akhter Wahida and Zainal Abedin Faruk spoke on different issues.

Mahbubur Rahman alleged that the government has taken no initiative to rescue people missing in the recent storm in his constituency in Patuakhali.

He regretted that the prime minister during her visit to the coastal belt on Tuesday rather 'blamed the dead and the missing people' saying that those who went to the sea violating weather signal were facing misfortune.

But the met office had not circulated any signal before the storm, the lawmaker said.

"The government has failed even to bury the recovered bodies of the strom victims," he added.

Rejecting the allegation, Altaf Hossain Chowdhury said met office had announced cautionary Signal-3 before the storm. "Before taking any measures, the atmosphere turned calm," he said.

The fishermen who returned from the sea after the storm said it was an unusual and sudden storm that they had never seen, Altaf claimed.