Two Bills were passed and another seeking improvement of living conditions of workers of the unorganised sector introduced in the Rajya Sabha Monday, even as a slightly thinned out opposition continued stalling the proceedings for the fifth consecutive day.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and AIADMK members' slogan shouting actually helped the government once again to complete some official business, including moving a bill on the unorganised sector not listed on the agenda despite protests by the Left members.

"In 15-20 minutes" after noon, when the upper house resumed its sitting after being adjourned within five minutes of Question Hour, "it managed to conduct more business than it normally does in a full day of activity," remarked an official of the parliamentary affairs ministry.

As many as 11 papers were laid amid noise from the opposition.

In addition, four ministers made statements relating to their ministries and three ministers managed to move for elections to the committees related to their ministries. Besides, two important bills were passed and a third was introduced without any discussion.

The official seemed pleased with the way the government has turned the opposition protest in its favour by pushing government business without any obstruction or discussion.

The opposition, meanwhile, was busy seeking a joint parliamentary committee (JPC) to examine implications of the Indo-US nuclear deal.

But there was some dilution even in that campaign.

The BJP and AIADMK continued raising slogans, "JPC lao, desh bachao (Form a JPC and save the nation)", "Sonia ne kya kiya? Desh ko bech diya" (What did Sonia do? Sell off the country) and "Left, UPA ki kya ladai, chor chor mausere bhai" (There's no fight between Left and United Progressive Alliance as they are both thieving cousins).

But many constituents of the main opposition National Democratic Alliance (NDA, including the Janata Dal-United (JD-U) that joined in the agitation last week, stayed out of it.

The most striking was the attitude of the Samajwadi Party, which suddenly decided to stay out of the protest though its United National Progressive Alliance (UNPA) leader AIADMK was as vociferous as last week.

The Telugu Desam Party (TDP), another UNPA constituent, was confused. While one TDP member, Lal Jan Basha, who had rushed to the well of the house last week with other agitators, stood for a while on his seat to demonstrate, the TDP's Rajya Sabha leader Raula Chandrasekhar Reddy remained firmly seated and demonstrated his distance from this agitation.

The Left later explained its opposition to the bill on the unorganised sector.

Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) leader Brinda Karat said, "We wanted a separate bill for the agriculture workers. We consider the present bill as considerably watered-down.

"They had appointed the Arjun Senguta Committee to go into the state of the unorganised sector. They should have at least incorporated the recommendations of the committee while drafting this Bill," said Karat.