Narendra Modi may have moved on politically from the traumatic events of 2002, but he is seemingly unable to forget the two months of the riots although he dismissed them at the time as “stray incidents” in a letter to the President of India. His targeting, therefore, of those whose conduct at the time displeased him can be seen as a way of settling scores.
It is difficult otherwise to explain the hounding, first, of Teesta Setalvad and now of Sanjiv Bhatt. As the Supreme Court’s view that “personal liberty cannot be put in the ventilator” with reference to the CBI’s charges against Setalvad suggests, the investigative agency has been acting yet again as a “caged parrot”, to quote the apex court once more, of the BJP-led Gujarat government this time as it purportedly did for the Congress-led alliance at the centre earlier.
That the Gujarat government should also target Bhatt is not surprising considering that the IPS officer had claimed that Modi, as chief minister, had told the police to go easy on the rioters in the aftermath of the deaths of kar sevaks in the Sabarmati express fire on February 27, 2002, which led to the communal outbreak.
How cases like these would have panned out but for the political interventions is difficult to say. But, there is little doubt that whenever the long arm of the law reaches out to someone who had taken on the government, of whatever hue, the feeling persists that the law was not following its own course, but was being manipulated.
It is to eradicate this belief in the public mind that the Supreme Court had sought to insulate the police from politics.
In a judgment in 2006, it sought to reform the 1861 Police Act by calling upon the state governments to grant immunity to the police from ruling parties. But the states have declined to abide by it on the grounds that it takes away the exclusive prerogative of the executive.
What the authorities have been unable to understand is that the partisan use of the police and the investigative agencies undermines both their credibility and professionalism.For instance, the decision to divest the director of the enforcement directorate, Rajan Katoch, of his charge following complaints from the saffron camp that he was not pursuing the case against Congress president, Sonia Gandhi, on the National Herald issue with due diligence not only underlines the government’s arbitrariness, but also reduces the enforcement directorate to being another caged parrot.
It stands to reason that the official who will replace Katoch will not be able to do anything other than find the Congress president guilty lest the Hindutva lobby engineers his removal as well. While such kowtowing to the government’s diktats in matters which are suggestive of vindictiveness is detrimental to an official’s sense of rectitude and professionalism, it is also undeniable that an adverse verdict against Sonia Gandhi will not be credible since it will be seen to have been delivered under official pressure.
The government’s decision, therefore, to plant someone in the enforcement directorate who will meekly carry out its orders will not serve its purpose of convincing the people that the Nehru-Gandhi family had indulged in some wrong-doing.
Such misgivings are also likely to be aired in the Setalvad and Sanjiv Bhatt cases besides evoking sympathy for the targets of official ire, which will defeat the government’s objective of portraying them as villains. Although unfavourable fallouts of this nature for the government can be easily anticipated, the ruling politicians are rarely mindful in their hubris of such likely consequences.
The untrammelled power in their hands apparently makes them believe that they can get away with anything, including acts of retribution against those who had the temerity to cross them in the past. It is a natural tendency, of course, to throw one’s weight about, but it is an inclination which must be avoided in a democracy, especially a vibrant one like India’s where the judiciary, the opposition and the media will not let any palpable abuse of authority go unchallenged.
Unfortunately, the Modi government does not seem to have appreciated these limitations on its arbitrary use of power. Perhaps the three consecutive terms in office in Gujarat where Modi faced little opposition as chief minister have convinced him of his political infallibility. He started, therefore, by imposing saffron factotums recommended by the RSS on institutes of high repute even if the appointees are seen, virtually without exception, as unfit for the posts because of their lack of scholarly or professional attainments.
The prime minister has also cautioned the Supreme Court against delivering what he called “perception-driven verdicts” involving “five-star activists”. Among the latter was a Greenpeace activist, Priya Pillai, who was taken off a London-bound plane in accordance with a home ministry decision which was subsequently criticized by the Delhi high court as an attempt to “muzzle dissent”. Pillai was on her way to make a presentation on tribal affairs in India.
Like Greenpeace, another well-regarded NGO, the Ford Foundation, is facing official wrath presumably because it had funded Teesta Setalvad’s humanitarian projects during the Gujarat riots. Three television channels have also been asked to explain their coverage of the Yakub Memon hanging. The parrots have never been busier. (IPA Service)
