The Hindu : Opinion / News Analysis : The stalling of Parliament

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Monday, May 02, 2005

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Opinion - News Analysis

The stalling of Parliament

Inder Malhotra

To make the nation's apex legislature totally dysfunctional is a remedy infinitely worse than the disease it is supposed to cure.

The question worrying those who still care is whether the world's largest democracy's Parliament is fated to be paralysed permanently? Judging by what is going on, this is by no means an alarmist cry, unless, of course, after its confabulations on Monday, the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) sees reason and ends its obstreperous boycott of Parliament, leave alone the utterly intemperate articulation of its demand for charge sheeted Railway Minister Lalu Prasad's instant removal from the Union Cabinet. It has rejected not only Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's appeal for a rational discussion on the subject but also Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee's invitation to an all-party meeting.

To be sure, continuance in high office of anyone against whom a court of law, not the executive, has framed charges of massive corruption is a serious matter.

Indeed, in a sane and mature democracy such an individual would have resigned voluntarily. But, sadly, the Indian polity has forfeited the right to be called either sane or mature.

It has established its own perverse norms. Under these, hardened criminals get elected to Parliament, even from behind bars, merely because they have not yet been convicted, which is easy to engineer, given the infamous judicial delays — another of India's dubious distinctions.

According to BJP president and Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha L.K. Advani, it is perfectly all right for criminals to get elected as MPs but he does not want any of them to be appointed a Minister. This amounts to accepting the root and trunk of an evil but quarrelling over the branches and leaves. Nor is this the worst part of the dismal story.

BJP double standards

The BJP is living in a make-believe world if it thinks that the country is taken in by its self-righteous shouting and has forgotten its own double standards and duplicitous stand on the self-same question of "tainted Ministers." Were not Mr. Advani (then no less than Deputy Prime Minister), Murli Manohar Joshi and Uma Bharti "tainted" when they were charge sheeted by a court of law under some of the sections of the Indian Penal Code that Lalu Prasad has also attracted? Did Atal Bihari Vajpayee rise to the highest standards of democracy and immediately accept the demand for the sacking of the trio? Of course, he did not

. And yet the BJP's propagandists have the cheek to accuse Dr. Manmohan Singh of "tainting" his own sterling reputation.

Some smart alecs in the saffron camp argue that Mr. Advani and his two colleagues were "charged only with political offences" whereas charges against the redoubtable Mr. Lalu Prasad are "criminal".

This is ridiculous rot. Neither the IPC nor the Criminal Procedure Code makes any such distinction. Moreover — and this is more important — in heaven's name, what is so political about one of history's worst acts of vandalism?

Indeed, how is the demolition of the Babri Masjid at Ayodhya different from the destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas by the Taliban of Afghanistan?

Nor can it be overlooked that Mr. Vajpayee also brought George Fernandes back into his Cabinet as Defence Minister, flying in the face of his and Mr. Fernandes' own solemn assurance to Parliament that he would return only after he had been cleared of the charges that had forced him to resign. The inquiry was still on when the restoration of "King George" took place.

`Coalition compulsions'

Let us face it. The problem of tainted ministers has become very complicated because of what are charmingly called the "compulsions of coalition politics."

Mr. Lalu Prasad controls 29 votes in the Lok Sabha. A thick-skinned questioner who persisted in demanding of the Prime Minister what he was "going to do about Laluji," was told courteously: "I don't have the mandate to dissolve my own Government."

Under the circumstances, there are only two ways in which the undoubtedly important and festering issue can be resolved. Instead of disrupting Parliament, let the BJP and its allies discuss the matter rationally.

An agreement on the exclusion of charge sheeted persons from the Council of Ministers would not be difficult to reach, provided the principal Opposition party has the good sense and fairness also to assure the Congress and the country that it would not use Mr. Lalu Prasad's exclusion from the Cabinet to bring the Manmohan Singh Government down during the 14th Lok Sabha's term.

If this is too much to expect — as it surely is — there is an alternative. The Supreme Court is already seized of the matter, and it has taken note of several more cases, besides the one relating to the fodder scam. Let the apex court do the needful.

In any case, to make the apex legislature of the nation totally dysfunctional is a remedy infinitely worse than the disease it is supposed to cure.

In our neighbourhood military dictators alone have locked up Parliaments. Are self-proclaimed democrats going to perpetrate this monstrosity here?

Tailpiece

Many of the admirers of Pakistan's President here have started calling him "General New Heart."

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