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| Don’t quit, Mr Speaker | | Vajpayee should mend fences with him | |
by L.M. Singhvi
THE long suffering Speaker of the Lok Sabha or, for that matter, the Chairman, must not resign even though it seems they have reason enough to do so personally. And that reason, in the case of the Speaker, lies in former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s unfortunate letter, so uncharacteristic of him. If the letter is genuine as it appears to be, it can only be explained by the personal compulsion of a leader who appears to have yielded to the strident voices in the NDA, in a moment of weakness.
But then, the Speaker or the Chairman in our system are not mere individuals occupying glittering throne-like Chairs in the Houses of Parliament. They personify the institution of Parliament. With them, institutional reasons must prevail over the personal on a priority basis.
Atalji’s letter hurts not only Mr. Speaker but all those who admire Atalji and regard him as a liberal democrat and parliamentarian par excellence. Atalji is right when he says that confidence has to be commanded and not demanded, but then it is an underserved slur on the Speaker on whom Atalji has been unreasonably harsh. The respect for the Speaker may not be demanded, but then it cannot also be remanded to the anger and the fury or the custody of any particular group in Parliament.
In failing to give implicit respect to the institution of Speaker, the House did not cover itself with glory. Nor did the BJP, which was believed to be a party with a difference. The nation witnessed it all on the television and it routinely shares the anguish of the two presiding officers of our bicameral Parliament. One wishes Atalji had introspected more impartially as a witness and an umpire. He should have guided the NDA courageously, candidly and persuasively as he alone could and still can.
His letter to the Speaker was a tragic departure from the standards of objectivity the country has come to expect of him as a statesman of exceptional stature. It was the unkindest cut of all for Mr Speaker, coming as it did from Atalji who allowed himself to lend his support to the parliamentary pandemonium and pressure which appeared to be a partisan aberration. All that the Speaker was trying to do was to canalise the ire of the Opposition into informed debate.
If Atalji were to be in the Speaker’s Chair, he would have done the same as did Mr Speaker. Surely Atalji knows it only too well that neither the Opposition nor the Government is entitled to set itself up as an arbiter over a presiding officer’s functions and to dictate to him. The whole nation was watching the scene which was far from edifying. We saw the disrobing of Democracy by errant Members. We expected the Bhishma Pitamah of our parliamentary Mahabharat to step forward and halt it all and give the House a clear sense of balance and direction.
Had he done so, the country’s love and respect for him would have been greatly reinforced. No doubt Natwar Singh is entitled to his day in Parliament. The people can also understand NDA’s new found love of momentary convenience for Natwar Singh. There is little doubt that Parliament is entitled to take umbrage on the leakage. Natwar Singh is entitled to his day in Parliament. But surely it has to be a battle of facts and logic, and wit and wisdom.
What the whole nation saw was the angry flood of party-political anger and invective spelling a cacophony of conflicting voices with far too many members of Parliament on their feet at the same time, and far too members in the pits or the wells of the Houses, when it was the duty of one and all to give aid, support and comfort to the Chair in the thick of the unruly conduct of the deliberations of the Houses.
The House had elected the Speaker unanimously and should now ask the Speaker unanimously to stay in office lest his resignation should raise an unprecedented and disastrous debate against our parliamentary system, a system which is ultimately meant to be the grand inquest of the nation with dignity and good sense.
The Parliamentary system of India cannot afford to fall from its democratic grace at this critical juncture. Atalji owes it to Parliamentary Democracy in India and to his own distinguished parliamentary career, which has been a saga of a glorious innings, to take a new initiative to create a climate of mutual respect, reciprocity and reconciliation. Equally, the Speaker owes it to the system to desist from departing from the office in dismay, by means of a resignation, which would signify a tragic collapse of parliamentary culture and institutional ethos, and our sense of pride in the system.
It lies within Atalji’s power and responsibility to begin a process of mending the fences and restoring the confidence of the Indian Parliamentary system in itself, though often impaired by unprincipled and strident allegiance to convenient and bullish populism by the political parties, a bullish and imprudent populism into which Indian democracy cannot over invest. That bullish populism must correct itself quickly if parliamentary democracy is to be of the people and for the people.
The writer, a former High Commissioner to the U.K (1991-98), is at present a Member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague
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