Parliamentary Questions: Starred, Unstarred, and Short-Notice

Every sitting day in Parliament opens the same way: an hour where MPs get to grill the government. Question Hour runs on strict rules, and a favourite UPSC trap simply swaps two of its question types around.

1Three question types, and the trap between them

Must Know

1.1 What are starred, unstarred, and short-notice questions?

Picture an MP standing up in the Lok Sabha to ask a minister about a railway delay. If their question is marked with an asterisk — a starred question — the minister has to answer it out loud, on the floor, right then. The MP can follow up, and so can other members. That back-and-forth is what makes a starred question feel like a real interrogation.

Now picture the same MP asking a routine question about how many new post offices opened last year. That’s an unstarred question. It gets a written answer only, tabled in the House, with no follow-ups and no live exchange. The Lok Sabha can list up to 230 of these in a single day, and the written-answer format is what makes that volume possible. There’s a third kind too: the short-notice question, for anything urgent enough that it can’t wait for the usual notice period. It skips the standard 10-day wait and, like a starred question, gets answered orally with supplementaries allowed. All three run inside the same window, Question Hour, the first hour of every sitting day in both Houses, governed by each House’s own Rules of Procedure.

Good to Know

1.2 When is a question not allowed?

Not every question an MP wants to ask actually gets listed. It has to fall within the Government of India’s own area of responsibility — asking about a state subject, or about something already public, won’t clear the bar. Courts get protection too: a matter that’s sub judice, still being actively heard, can get a question barred if discussing it in the House could prejudice the case. A case that’s already been decided doesn’t carry that protection.

There’s also a hard word limit, 150 words per question, and a notice period of roughly 15 days for an unstarred question. Add the daily caps: 230 unstarred questions in the Lok Sabha, 155 in the Rajya Sabha. With far more requests than slots, both Houses use a computerised auto-ballot to decide which questions actually get listed on a given day.

2Zero Hour and the adjournment motion

Must Know

2.1 What is Zero Hour, and how is it different from Question Hour?

The moment Question Hour ends, something odd happens: Zero Hour begins, and almost none of the rules that governed the previous hour apply anymore. There’s no entry in the Rules of Procedure that defines Zero Hour — it exists only because MPs started doing it, and the practice stuck. That’s exactly why it’s so useful to them: a member can stand up and raise an urgent matter with zero notice, none of the paperwork a formal question needs, and no fixed time limit written into any rulebook. It runs until the day’s official business is taken up, giving members a genuinely improvised window inside an otherwise tightly scheduled day.

Good to Know

2.2 What is an adjournment motion, and why does it exist only in the Lok Sabha?

Here’s a tool that isn’t a question at all. An adjournment motion sets aside the entire day’s scheduled business, just to debate one definite matter of urgent public importance. What makes it heavier than any question is what it implies: moving one carries an implicit censure of the government, a formal way of saying the government has failed on this specific matter. Because of that weight, it can be moved only in the Lok Sabha, needs at least 50 members backing it, and requires the Speaker’s consent before it can even be taken up. The Rajya Sabha has no equivalent device at all.

3Colonial origins

Great to Know

3.1 Where did this right come from?

The right to question the executive is older than most people assume — it goes back to the Indian Councils Act, 1892. Even then, members could ask a question, though only after six days’ notice, and with no right to a follow-up. The very first question under this system was asked on 16 February 1893, by the Maharaja of Bhinga, in a colonial-era legislative council, with no supplementaries to press him further. The Indian Councils Act, 1909, the Morley-Minto reforms, widened these councils’ powers further still, building on that early, limited right. Modern Question Hour, with live oral answers and real supplementaries, grew out of that narrow colonial starting point over decades.

4Exam Practice: PYQ Pattern

Common traps in this topic

• Swapping starred and unstarred: starred gets an oral answer with supplementaries, unstarred gets a written answer only.
• Claiming Zero Hour is rule-based like Question Hour. It has no basis in the formal Rules of Procedure.
• Claiming an adjournment motion can be moved in either House. It’s Lok Sabha only.

5Current Affairs

Current Affairs

Question Hour disruptions in 2026

On 3 February 2026, eight opposition MPs, seven from Congress and one from CPI(M), were suspended from the Lok Sabha for unruly behaviour during a minister’s Question Hour answer. A week later, on 10 February, the House was adjourned again after fresh opposition uproar during the same hour. Disruption of Question Hour keeps showing up in the news, session after session. Exams like to test whether you actually followed it, often by pairing a specific suspension count to a specific session, so treat the numbers, not just the pattern, as worth remembering.