Honourable MPs or delinquent children?

Honourable MPs or delinquent children?

FPJ BureauUpdated: Friday, May 31, 2019, 11:59 PM IST
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Whether or not you realize it, those indulging in gross unparliamentary conduct inside Parliament would like you to believe that they are doing so for your good. The determined disruption, ugly name-calling, storming into the well of the House, brandishing senseless placards, etc, dear people, is all being done in your name, for your sake. Well, if the Congress leadership has such a low impression of the collective intelligence of the common people, it is in for a shock. For, its antics, bordering on boorishness, do not endear it to anyone. The partisans already on its side do not require such a display of bad behavior in the sanctum sanctorum of democracy for them to stay loyal to it. However, the damage it does to the health of our parliamentary democracy is immense. Such cynical abuse of the parliamentary forum for taking out one’s pique, nay hatred, for the ruling regime can only erode people’s faith in the system.

As it is, ordinary people can have nothing but contempt for their elected representatives. But when they see them live on their televisions inside the two Houses of Parliament, behaving worse than rowdy and rude school children, can they be expected to have any respect for these `honourable MPs’? We think not. The argument that the current ruling party, while in the Opposition, too had resorted to such obstructionist tactics is wrong on two counts. One, Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj, at worst, is guilty of an impropriety, nothing more. No financial loss to the exchequer is caused by her action in helping the London-based Lalit Modi secure travel papers. Two, there are no serious charges against any of the central ministers which the ruling party might be refusing to investigate. What do you investigate in Swaraj’s intervention with the British for travel documents for the former IPL boss? She has not denied that she interceded on Lalit Modi’s behalf with the British.

As for the Vyapam scam and the deaths associated with it, not only is its operation supposed to be concentrated in Madhya Pradesh, but after the institution of a regular CBI probe there is not very much the central government can do in the matter. In the case of Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje, her affidavit to the British supporting Lalit Modi’s case for being allowed to stay in the UK pertains to the period when she was out of power. Again, it is certainly not a case of abuse of power or even of a grave impropriety that she should be made to resign as chief minister.

Besides, if the Congress leadership cared to look itself in the mirror, it will find that its record in power is replete with humongous money-making scams which have left it with zero moral authority to talk of corruption and wrong-doing. One Ottavio Quattorocchhi, a very close family friend of Sonia Gandhi, made money in fertilizer deals with the Indian Government so long as Sanjay Gandhi was around. But once he died and Rajiv Gandhi was wheeled out as her successor -and Sonia Gandhi deigned to acquire Indian citizenship at long last – he became the sole clearing agent for even defence deals. From the way the Congress government protected him in the Bofors scam, it only strengthened the BJP charge that Quattorocchhi regularly shared the loot with Sonia Gandhi’s family back in Italy. The short point is that the Congress, of all the parties represented inside Parliament, has no moral right to throw mud at others. Besides, as we said above, in none of the cases against the NDA ministers is there any suspicion that any one of them made money.

Meanwhile, the Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan needs to be commended for reminding the members that she is duly empowered to take disciplinary action against those indulging in most undignified and unruly behavior. She cited rules to buttress the point that brandishing placards inside the House was flagrant misconduct liable to be punished with suspension of the errant members.  As we said in this space on Wednesday, July 22, the presiding officers in both Houses ought to draw a red line and warn members that its breach would result in strict disciplinary action. Parliament cannot be held to ransom merely because a section of the Opposition has got into its head that the only way it can win back the trust of the people is to behave like juvenile miscreants inside the House. It is unbecoming of so-called honourable MPs. Meanwhile, the Government would do well to reach out to the sensible sections in the Opposition and inquire if the logjam created by the cussedness of the Congress can be broken without further confrontation. It says a lot of the intellectual bankruptcy of the left that Sitaram Yechuri, the newly-minted boss of the CPI(M), is being led by the nose by the Gandhis. At least, his predecessor, Prakash Karat, had displayed better sense than to play a camp follower of the decadent and decrepit Congress leadership.

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