26

Dec

Belittling the  High Office 

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Today’s Edition

New Delhi, 26 December 2023

Satish Misra

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Sordidly anguishing episode of suspension of 146 people’s representatives from the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha during the recently concluded winter session is the latest of the attempts that ruling party led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been making to subvert and undermine the higher constitutional offices of the country with the final objective of silencing and strangulating democracy since it assumed power in 2014.  

While Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla has been acting as a puppet of the treasury benches since he assumed high office, Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar has not lagged behind in performing as His Masters’ Voice. Dhankhar continues to create ripples of controversy as did as Bengal’s Governor earlier and now as Rajya Sabha’s Chairman which has so succinctly and categorically been pointed out by Leader of Opposition Malikarjun Kharge.

Kharge minces no words in his reply saying that Dhankhar’s letter to him “unfortunately justifies the autocratic and arrogant attitude of the Government towards Parliament."  The Leader of the Opposition in the upper house said as the custodian of the House, the Chairman should protect the people's right to hold its government accountable in Parliament.

It would be distressing when history judges the presiding officers harshly for Bills passed without debate and not seeking accountability from the government. It is disappointing that the Chairman feels effecting suspensions facilitated legislative business by passing bills without discussion, Kharge said.

Hitting hard, Leader of the opposition said that the ruling party has "weaponised" the suspension of MPs as a convenient tool to "undermine democracy, sabotage Parliamentary practices and throttle the Constitution”.

In his detailed counter to the points raised by Dhankhar, the senior Congress president maintains standards of parliamentary decency and grace urging him to examine his concerns "objectively and with neutrality as the Chairman of the Rajya Sabha."

Though Dhankhar’s record both as Rajya Sabha’s chairman and Vice President now and that of the Governor earlier has been that of a cheer leader of the government, the Congress leader has not said this what he would have otherwise stressed had he not been constrained by old school mannerism and etiquettes which have been put in cold storage by the ruling BJP leaders.  

"If anything privilege motions have also been weaponised to muzzle the voice of the Opposition. This is a deliberate design of the ruling dispensation to undermine Parliament itself. By suspending MPs, the government is effectively silencing the voice of the voters of 146 MPs altogether," Kharge said.

Kharge has emphatically dismissed Dhankhar’s assertion that disorder was deliberate and strategised and predetermined saying that if anything, it is the mass suspension of the Opposition MPs from both Houses of Parliament that seems to be predetermined and premeditated by the Government.  It was executed without any application of mind, as can be seen by the suspension of an INDIA party MP who was not even present in the Parliament, the Congress leader said.

Recognising Rajya Sabha’s Chairman right to decide on notices, Kharge stressed that it was regrettable that the Chair condoned the attitude of the Home Minister and the Government who declined to make a statement on the floor of the House but chose to make his first public statement to a TV channel when Parliament was in session and the Chair did not find that a sacrilege the temple of democracy.

Even though a Union minister allegedly informed an opposition parliamentarian that most opposition MPs will be suspended before the Home minister is present in the Rajya Sabha but the Chairman did not find it necessary to make an inquiry if such a threat was indeed issued. “Such comments grossly undermines the Chair who we believe is the final authority on conducting the House including suspension of members".

"It was even more regrettable that the Home Minister made his first public statement before a TV channel when Parliament was in session and the Chair did not find that sacrileging the temple of democracy," Kharge said.

He added that by suspending the MPs, the government is effectively silencing the voice of the voters of 146 MPs altogether.

"The Chairman should also kindly note that the government has escaped accountability on all crucial issues like serious border incursions by China, or continued unrest in Manipur or the recent intrusion in the Lok Sabha by visitors who had been facilitated entry by a BJP MP," he said.

Agreeing with the Chairman that they need to move ahead, Kharge, however, stressed that the answer may not lie in a discussion in the Chairman's chambers, if the government is not keen on running the House. Leader of the Opposition said he is currently out of Delhi and it would be his "privilege and duty" to meet the Chairman as soon as he is back.

Dhankhar’s main aim in his life has been that of power seeker and he can stoop to any depths to occupy a chair. Ideologically, he has been a Socialist, a Congressman and now in the BJP. He has rarely been shy of playing the role of an henchman as was more than evident when he remained Bengal’s Governor from 2019 to 2022 before he was chosen as the vice presidential candidate by none other than Prime Minister Modi.  

He did everything possible in his might to create obstacles on the path of governance of the popularly elected government of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee weakening the federal principles of the Constitution. Dhankhar tried to promote and protect the BJP in the state while working against the ruling Trinamool Congress.  

Dhankhar’s outcry, raising a political storm on his mimicry by the Trinamool Congress MP Kalyan Banerjee was aimed at pleasing 'His Masters' , possibly expecting that he would be rewarded with the highest office in the country that of the President when decided to  divert the popular attention from suspension of MPs. The Vice President sought to play the sympathy card when he compared his mimicry as an insult to Jats and famers of the country.

Dhankhar said the Trinamool MP's "shameful" act of mimicry had pained him and that he had been insulted as a farmer's son from the Jat community. He had also hit out at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for filming Banerjee's act.

Alas, Banerjee has put the whole issue in perspective when he pointed out that the first person to perform mimicry inside Lok Sabha was none other than Prime Minister Narendra Modi.       

Replying to the Vice-President's remark that he had been insulted as a farmer's son, the Trinamool MP dared him to tell the people of the country how many days he had worked in a field. "I pray that crores of farmers in the country amass as much property as him”.

"You say you are a farmer's son. You wear a suit worth Rs 20 lakh. Many Indian farmers can't even afford a blanket in this winter. So after rising to such a position, how many lakh blankets have you sent to their homes. Please tell the people," Banerjee asked, baring Dhankhar before the people.

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