DHAKA: India’s new prime minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday said there should be no space in Parliament for criminals, where a record number of elected representatives face charges.

Modi, who pledged a clean and efficient government to help revive the slowing economy, said lawmakers who have criminal backgrounds should go to jail and ‘free both houses of this disgrace’.

‘There is always this comprehensive discussion that only those who have criminal backgrounds go to parliament. This is the image people have,’ Modi told the Upper House of Parliament, reports The Straits Times.

‘It is our responsibility to free both our houses of this disgrace.’

Modi’s right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which thrashed the left-leaning Congress party in marathon polls in April and May, made reviving the economy the main plank of its campaign as well as promising to clean up the government.

BDST: 2054 HRS, JUNE 11, 2014