NO POINT IN RECITING SARKARIA MANTRA EVERY TIME

When we listen to the public discourse on television talk shows or when we flip through the newspapers, we wonder whether “rape” has become the national pastime. Gone are the days when it was considered that the use of this word would be an “uncivil” or “unprintable” expression. “Outraging the modesty of woman” was considered to be the appropriate phrase to report cases of rape. Of course, we are living in different times. Foreign tourists are subjected to this inhuman act quite often, policemen commit such atrocities on their own female colleagues, i.e if they don’t get other victims, father does it on daughter or daughter-in-law and so on and so forth.

Even as we are disgusted with this obnoxious social crime, what do the politicians do? When they don’t get gullible women, they “rape” democracy. This is the precise expression we hear these days – Rape and murder of democracy. Is this something new?

Quarter century ago, the late NTR made the same charge against the then Governor Ram Lal and the Opposition in Karnataka has fine -tuned the same theme song today. Prior to the Ram Lal episode, which humbled the all-powerful Indira Gandhi, and after Ram Lal, there were a number of such outrages on the modesty of democracy and our Constitution. In 90% of the cases, the rapist was none other than the Congress appointed Governors who invariably acted as the agents of the ruling party at the Centre. Exceptions can be counted on your fingers.
Hansraj Bharadwaj, considered to be the retainer of 10 Janpath, is only the latest manifestation of this malaise afflicting the nation. When he was the Union Law Minister, he was only acting as the personal legal adviser of Madam to help her wriggle out of crises. He must have thought God has sent him to this planet only to serve the cause of the Congress party.

But to be fair to the “Panditji”, Karnataka chief minister BS Yeddiyurappa also seduced him to commit the “offence”. There were a slew of corruption charges, his MLAs were a greedy lot and paraded themselves for “sale” with a price tag ranging from 20 crores of rupees to 40 crores. Yeddy’s administration was a good example for “bad governance”. HD Kumaraswamy had only acted as an efficient “pimp” when he lured the rebel MLAs, paraded them before the Governor and took them on a pleasure trip to resorts. There was no discipline in the ruling party, a point on which none can disagree with the Governor. It was just a year ago, BSY came out of the crisis engineered by Reddy Brothers who are now behind the beleaguered chief minister. BSY convincingly proved that he is clueless and tactless in political management.

Does this make the act of Governor legal and constitutional when he originally wanted President’s rule? Is there a state government in the country which cannot be accused of corruption? If unproved corruption and indiscipline in the party are the only criteria for constitutional remedy, President Pratibha Patil should have advised Prime Minister ManMohan Singh to step down as he has been shielding notoriously corrupt ministers in his cabinet. Can we have a better example than A Raja who was instrumental in making the government to lose one lakh crore of rupees by bending and twisting every prescribed procedure to benefit his accomplices? Now that the Commonwealth Games are over, Suresh Kalmadi will walk free with no accountability.

What is the state of Congress party in Andhra Pradesh? There are ‘n’ number of scams. A Congress MP wants the CM to quit if he can’t remove the corrupt ministers. Another MP suggests that the Congress cannot win any election in future. APCC is merely a conglomeration of disparate groups representing various regions and interests in the state each one cutting the throat of the other.

Everyone who has some air time in the channels and column space in the newspapers are saying that democracy was trampled in the Karnataka Legislative Assembly and the entire proceedings were vitiated on 11th Oct. Blame is apportioned on the Speaker for not maintaining the decorum in the House. Look at the scenario. Both the Congress and JD(S) members of the House acted as hoodlums assaulting the Police Commissioner and the Marshals and the disqualified members of the BJP and Independents forcing their way into the House, and some other members creating ruckus on the floor. Was it possible to have a division of votes in a proper manner? Chaos in the House was not in the interest of the ruling party. But it is the Opposition that wanted to disable the Speaker from conducting the proceedings of the House and he resorted to voice vote.
That apart, the charge against the Speaker is that he violated the provisions of the Anti-defection law. Yes, he failed to follow the letter of the Law, but not the spirit. Rebels’ intentions are no secret. They wanted to overthrow their own elected government with the help of the “political lepers” in the state ably assisted by the Congress and the Governor, party’s political manager in the state. When you know a person is going to commit a murder, should the policeman watch and wait until he commits murder or should he prevent a dastardly crime? Rebels had nothing to lose were they to be disqualified after the voting, except for the remaining term of 2 and-a-half years. But they have been adequately compensated for the loss. But what would have been the damage to democracy when a handful of greedy legislators could succeed in dislodging a democratically elected government? Obviously, there is a big loophole in the law which encourages the kind of defection that was witnessed in Karnataka.

Even if the anti-defection law is made foolproof there is no guarantee that the office of the Governor will not be misused and there will be no political rehabilitation for those who are defeated by the people. Whenever we find a situation where the politically rehabilitated governors misuse their office, we extensively quote from the report of the Sarkaria Commission on the appointment of governors which has only archival value. After the dust is settled the report is forgotten.

Irrespective of the party at the Centre, there is temptation for the government to use the office of the Governor for political agenda. It started in 1950s when the “great democract” Jawaharlal Nehru invoked Art 356 in Kerala. The unholy and anti-democratic tradition continues. Karnataka is just a recent example. Only compulsions of numbers in Parliament forced the Centre to retreat from imposition of President’s rule. Therefore, instead of reciting Sarkaria mantra every time depending on which side of the fence you are placed, there must be a serious attempt by all concerned to make some of the suggestions of Sarkaria Commission on the appointment of governors as law. Constitution should be amended in such a manner that there is a clear disqualification for those who held political office in the last 5 or 10 years or those held active party positions to be appointed as governors. Unless this is done, Karnatakas are bound to recur and Bharadwajes will continue to “rape” democracy.