President Bidya Bhandari has prorogued the ongoing session of the Federal Parliament effective from Tuesday midnight, the Parliament Secretariat said in a statement.

A Cabinet meeting earlier in the day had decided to recommend for prorogation of the ongoing 10th session, according to Minister for Communication and Information Technology Gyanendra Bahadur Karki.

The Parliament had largely remained dysfunctional with the main opposition CPN-UML continuously obstructing the proceedings protesting against the Speaker, claiming that he supported the party’s split by refusing to take action against 14 dissident UML lawmakers until they formed a new party.

“The parliament was dysfunctional for the past several months. We tried our best to resolve the dispute with the main opposition but they were not cooperative,” Minister for Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs, Dilendra Prasad Badu, said.

Several crucial bills including one related to amending the Citizenship Act are pending in the House for a long time. The government, however, had withdrawn a key bill related to the Federal Civil Service on October 8 last year.

“We made repeated attempts to reach out to the opposition seeking their support and participation for the passage of the crucial bills but our efforts went in vain. Also, party leaders including lawmakers are currently busy in campaigns for local elections in their respective districts. So we decided to recommend for prorogation of the House,” said Badu.

During this session, the Millennium Challenge Corporation Nepal Compact–the $500 million US grant–was endorsed after a long dispute among the parties. The compact was endorsed with majority votes amid chanting of slogans against the Speaker by the UML.

In the 92 days of the tenth session of the lower house that began on December 14, only 11 meetings were held and accomplished two tasks–forming an 11-member impeachment recommendation committee to study the allegations against Chief Justice Cholendra Shumsher Rana besides endorsing the MCC compact.