A recent news report announced that after the infamous pepper spray incident in the Lok Sabha, Google had swung into action to design smart cameras which will be programmed to “be intelligent, motorised eyes that can respond to obscenities of all types e.g. audio, visual, and, even social and political. For instance, the moment a leader shouts something like ‘bhen’, our camera will zoom into another leader sleeping in the House so that people think that no abuses were exchanged and things are going normal”.
Google representative explained how all proceedings of the legislature would become cultured from now on. The cameras would pick up objectionable items like currency note bundles, pornographic images, abusive humans, naked humans, running humans etc, and replace these images with ready to use footage of cultured behaviour. In extreme situations the cameras will shut themselves down and focus permanently on an image of Mahatma Gandhi.
The new report mentioned some other items of immense relevance to parliamentarians: It said that since the defence budget had been hiked, L. Rajagopal, an MP, had strongly recommended the large scale purchase of pepper spray by the Army. Another story referred to the anguish of a Rajya Sabha member who was deeply saddened that equal opportunity had not been given to Rajya Sabha members to black out proceedings. “Aakhir hum bhi honourable sansad hai” was his sad refrain.
A prominent news item said that the Speaker had decided that Lok Sabha would now be adjourned before it was disrupted, so that instead of saying “Baith jaiye”, she would say before 11 am, “Uth jaiye, bahar jaiye”. It was then that I saw that the news item was a humorous, albeit devastating, satire on our Parliament, and the name of the reporter was notthatmp. Get it? Not that MP. Not so funny, really. As the last session of the 15th Lok Sabha came to an inglorious close, I felt that I could hear a silent, primal scream from the tortured pillars and institutions of our vibrant democracy. There are very many pillars of our democracy, new and old, and there is much to be discussed about each. But the most painful and burning topic, de jure, is, without doubt, the state of our legislatures.
According to serious reports and not ironical satires the performance of this Lok Sabha was apparently the most dismal in our legislative history. The present Lok Sabha has the longest list unfinished business more than 75 pending bills. It was definitely the most expensive approximately Rs 10,000 crore was spent to elect 543 members, Rs 245 crore disbursed annually towards their salary, and Rs 2.5 lakh per minute was spent for every minute that Parliament was in session. Not to mention the Question Hour, that most hallowed of parliamentary institutions which gives MPs an opportunity to question the government on its policy and performance, which also costs the nation a staggering amount in terms of man hours and resources spent in preparing for it. There was hardly a day when Question Hour functioned. Only 13 per cent of Parliament’s time was spent on making laws, and 20 bills were passed with less than five minutes’ discussion. And this Parliament was productive for only 63 per cent of its allotted time to begin with.
However, the above is the good news. The productivity of Parliament is the least of the problems when one contemplates the behaviour of some elected representatives, not just in Parliament but in state Assemblies as well. I have been in Parliament since 1986, with a five year break in between. The day I entered Parliament as a young, elected MP, I wanted to bend down and touch the hallowed ground in respect and homage. Indeed, for many years thereafter, although we witnessed and participated in acrimonious debates, I never ever imagined that things would come to the sorry pass that we find ourselves in today almost objects of hate and ridicule in the eyes of the very people who have elected us.
The pepper spray incident has brought unspeakable dishonour to Parliament, in its own way as destructive of the institution as the day when currency notes were flying around the Lok Sabha. However, it was the scene in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly which plunged me into virtually irredeemable depression. MLAs standing bare chested and, worse still, a minister from the treasury bench encouraging them to take off their trousers as well to prove their “mardangi” (masculinity). The time has truly come when we need to ask ourselves whether our legislative system can survive this assault. This is no longer a question of whose fault it was that Parliament did not function, or why bills were not passed. It is a far more fundamental problem of whether a legislative system can even remain in place.
In the UK, the treasury benches and Opposition face each other. It was considered an adversarial design and the space or distance between the treasury benches and Opposition had to be a minimum of the length of two swords in order to ensure that no angry MP thrust a sword into a political opponent. In the US, which claims to be the oldest democracy in the world, a more convivial system of MPs sitting in a semi circle facing the Speaker was evolved, and that is the model we follow. Alas, the model of convivial debate is one we appear to be unable to live up to. Our founding fathers envisaged reasoned debate and dissent, with the treasury benches responding in kind. Policies would be discussed, and laws formulated.
Even in their worst nightmares they would not have imagined pepper spray being used in Parliament, or members taking off their clothes. Perhaps, the bottomline is that bad behaviour, a euphemism for the abominations which have occurred is far easier to indulge in, and politics of the rowdy kind is far more dramatic and effective that serious policy-making debate and discussion. The media, too, finds it useful to sensationalise bad behaviour and reward it. When drama and politics trump policy and statesmanship, good people will shun the legislative forum, which will ultimately lose relevance in our democracy. The time has come to solemnly remind ourselves that if we continue in this way, we will make ourselves redundant. Therefore, political parties, individual MPs, in fact, the entire political establishment and the media have to do a reality check to ensure that the slide downwards is stopped, and Parliament’s democratic glory is restored.
