WASHINGTON, Oct 1: US President Barack Obama declared on Tuesday that his signature health-care law was “here to stay”, although Republican lawmakers forced the US federal government to shut down.

As the day began, thousands of government workers arrived at their offices in Washington only to be told that their services were no more required. They were also asked to clean off their desks, set out-of-office emails and to prepare for a possible long unemployment.

The shutdown affects more than 800,000 federal workers and 400,000 civilian employees of the US Department of Defence. Uniformed troops, however, will continue to receive their salaries.

Border patrol officers, prison guards and air traffic controllers were still required to work but were told they might not be paid.

Visibly agitated by these developments, President Obama addressed the nation from the White House, telling them that “this Republican shutdown did not have to happen”.

Accompanied by supporters of his health-care plan, Mr Obama declared that the law was “here to stay” because that’s what the people wanted.

The ‘irony’ of the entire dispute, he said, was that it “doesn’t accomplish their stated goal” of de-funding ‘Obamacare’ because its sources of funding were already in place.

“They’re shutting down the government over an ideological crusade to deny affordable health-care to many Americans,” the president said.

“Of all the responsibilities the constitution endows to Congress, two should be fairly simple: pass a budget, and pay America’s bills”, but this was exactly what the Republicans were refusing to do, he added.

Earlier in the day, US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel told US troops that President Obama had already signed into law an exemption of the uniformed military.

“They will be paid regardless of how long this goes,” he said, but warned that the Pentagon’s civilian workers would be affected. “We’ll probably have to furlough about 400,000 DOD civilians,” he added.

The shutdown began in the morning when the US Senate rejected a House motion to go to conference over the continuing resolution to keep the government funded.

The White House was one of the immediate victims of the shutdown as it could not update its official website.

Those who visited the website on Tuesday afternoon confronted this message: “Due to Congress’s failure to pass legislation to fund the government, the information on this website may not be up to date. Some submissions may not be processed, and we may not be able to respond to your inquiries.”

An earlier message on the website informed the visitors that “because Congress did not fulfil its responsibility to pass a budget, much of the federal government will shut down.”

The visitors were directed to another site, usa.gov, only to read another message: “Due to a lapse in funding, the US federal government has shut down.”

The dispute also closed museums and national parks and slowed everything from trade negotiations to medical research.

The stalemate continued till late Tuesday afternoon as Republicans insisted that they would release funds only if Democrats agreed to de-fund Obamacare. Democrats said they would never allow it to happen.

“The government is closed,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat, said. “All over America, federal employees are getting furloughs this morning … because of the irrationality that is going on in the other side of the Capitol.”

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, a Republican, blamed Senate Democrats for the situation.

“Clearly, the Senate has demonstrated that it is not willing to engage in the legislative process. And that is why the House and the Speaker took the position,” he said.